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63-450: Enterprise-Record may refer to: Chico Enterprise-Record , a daily newspaper of Chico, California The Davie County Enterprise-Record , a weekly newspaper serving Davie County, North Carolina Topics referred to by the same term [REDACTED] This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the title Enterprise-Record . If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change

126-473: A moratorium on new home construction in fire-prone areas. In September 2009 however, the Butte County Board of Supervisors called the grand jury report "not reasonable", citing improved building codes and fire prevention requirements as arguments against a moratorium. Despite these reports, Paradise city planners did not include study results in new plans. In 2009, the town of Paradise proposed

189-504: A Butte County civil grand jury report concluded that the roads leading from Paradise and Upper Ridge communities had "significant constraints" and "capacity limitations" on their use as evacuation routes. The report noted a combination of road conditions "which increases the fire danger and the possibility of being closed due to fire and or smoke", namely sharp curves, inadequate shoulders, and fire hazards adjacent to shoulders, such as "fire fuel and steep slopes". The report also recommended

252-467: A dirt road surrounded by barbed wire as the fire encroached. In the second, a fire captain and a firefighter received face and neck burns on November 9 when a propane tank exploded as they were defending a house from the fire. Summary of impact on population and first responders reported by Cal Fire. The fire forced the evacuation of Paradise , Magalia , Centerville , Concow , Pulga , Butte Creek Canyon , Berry Creek and Yankee Hill and threatened

315-456: A loss of 17 cell towers. Thousands of calls to 9-1-1 inundated two emergency dispatchers on duty. Emergency alerts suffered human error as city officials failed to include four at-risk areas of the city in evacuation orders and technical error as emergency alerts failed to reach 94 percent of residents in some areas and even in areas with the highest success still failed to reach 25 percent of those residents signed up. At about 1:00 p.m.,

378-601: A mandatory evacuation, and should collect their belongings and leave. By 8:20 a.m., the Paradise 911 dispatch center had received 132 calls about the fire and, overwhelmed by the sheer quantity, began forwarding them to the dispatch center in Chico. The main fire front reached Paradise at 8:30 a.m. between Apple View Way and Merrill Road. At this point it was approximately 0.6 miles (1 km) across, and shortly thereafter grew to two miles (2.8 km) wide as it grew to

441-538: A reduced number of travel lanes on the roadways and received state funding from the California Department of Transportation to implement a road diet along Skyway, Pearson Road, and Clark Road, three of the town's main thoroughfares and evacuation routes. Paradise planners opted in March 2015 to convert Skyway into a one-way route during emergencies, effectively doubling its capacity. Despite this change,

504-408: A reporting location. The fire was named after Camp Creek Road, near its place of origin. The road was unpaved and poorly maintained; it had taken one of McKenzie's engines an hour to travel one mile (1.6 km) along it during a previous fire. McKenzie requested that Cal Fire activate its aircraft earlier than their scheduled 8:00 a.m. flight time, and requested more personnel to try and stop

567-754: A reservoir to escape the flames. Butte County Sheriff's Department initially reported a partial death count for each community (total 67): 50 in Paradise , seven in Concow , nine in Magalia , and one in Chico . Five firefighters were injured during two separate incidents in the first two days of the Camp Fire. In the first, one fire captain and two prison inmate firefighters were seriously burned on their upper bodies on November 8 when shifting winds trapped them on

630-518: A vehicle and two on ATVs. Some residents who were unable to evacuate survived by sheltering in place at the American gas station and the Nearly New antique store across the street. Others gathered in the nearby parking lot shared by a KMart and a Save Mart. The survival of some of those who sheltered in place has raised the question of whether in some scenarios last-minute mass evacuations provide

693-508: Is nearly inaccessible. It is on the west side of the river underneath the transmission lines. It’s got about a 35 mi/h sustained wind on it. We’ll keep working on access. I’m going to go up the highway to try and get a better idea about how to get to it. It’s a possibility we may have to come in off the top of Concow Road; Flea Mountain… This has got potential for a major incident. Request 15 additional engines, 4 additional dozers, 2 water tenders, 4 strike teams of hand crews. I’ll get back to you on

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756-461: Is responsible for inspecting PG&E's electrical infrastructure. The scope of the CPUC in relation to the scope of electrical infrastructure is unbalanced, however, and the CPUC has had difficulty fulfilling their oversight mandate. A CPUC inspection of the section of the 115 kV Caribou-Palermo line at the origin of the Camp Fire had not been conducted in six years. Many of the electrical towers along

819-801: Is the result of the merger of the Chico Enterprise and the Chico Record on Dec. 6, 1948. Both predecessor publications had a long and storied history throughout the north valley of the Sacramento River . The Chico Record can trace its roots to the Butte Record. The Butte Record moved publication from Bidwell Bar to Oroville in 1856 where it was briefly known as the Oroville Union Record from 1864 to 1866. The publication would relocate to Chico in 1873 and after

882-440: The "Abnormally Dry" category beginning in late June. By November 8, Butte County's lower elevations had gone more than 200 days without receiving one-half inch (1.3 cm) of rain. The energy release component (ERC), a metric for the dryness and flammability of vegetation, was above average all summer. As summer turned into fall and significant rain had not materialized by early October, ERC levels were well above average, and on

945-576: The Butte Lightning Complex burned 100,000 acres (40,470 ha) on either side of Paradise, killing two people and destroying hundreds of buildings in the region. In 2005, the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (Cal Fire) released a fire management plan for the region, which warned that the town of Paradise was at risk for an east wind-driven conflagration similar to the Oakland firestorm of 1991 . In June 2009,

1008-421: The CPUC gave PG&E permission to replace the aging line, though the design did not include line hardening through high fire hazard areas. The winter of 2016–2017 saw above-average precipitation across much of California, ending a six-year statewide drought . One of the effects of the wet winter was the second spring in a row with an above-average grass crop. That winter was followed by that of 2017–2018, which

1071-613: The Camp Fire's ignition, as the company did not de-energize transmission lines. The downslope winds that formed on November 8 were particularly intense through Jarbo Gap, an area where air squeezes through the Feather River Canyon from the northeast. These "Jarbo Gap winds" commonly developed in the autumn, and in the fifteen years prior to the Camp Fire, records showed 35 days with wind gusts higher than 100 miles per hour (160 km/h). Gusty winds at Jarbo Gap began at about 7:00 p.m. on November 7 and increased over

1134-618: The Caribou-Palermo line were unusually high. A 2012 windstorm brought down five towers. After the Camp Fire, the CPUC's Safety and Enforcement Table Mountain Division audited three years of the missing ten years of PG&E's records. Focusing on where the Camp Fire broke out, the audit found "the company was late in fixing 900 problems on its towers and other equipment, including two critical threats that regulators say languished more than 600 days before being repaired." In May 2018,

1197-743: The Enterprise and the Record emerged as Chico's two primary newspapers. They competed against each other through the 1940s. They published together for the first time in a single combined edition in October 1946 due to a printer's strike. The Enterprise and the Record consolidated ownership in Nov. 13, 1947 when Record owners, Stanley and Samuel Beaubaire, sold their paper to the Chico Enterprise. Enterprise Publishing Co. published separate editions of

1260-502: The Enterprise and the Record until Dec. 6, 1948 when they were merged into the Chico Enterprise-Record. After merging, the paper was published in the afternoons Monday through Friday and on Saturday mornings. The newspaper's office and printing presses were at 700 Broadway. On March 14, 1983, more than a century of local ownership ended when the publication was sold to Donrey Media Group of Fort Smith, Ark. One change

1323-700: The Enterprise-Record include the Oroville Mercury-Register . Throughout its history as the Enterprise-Record, the newspaper has never missed a scheduled publication day. There have been several challenges to that accomplishment, including an earthquake in August 1975 which knocked out power to the newspaper's offices for several hours. The shock measured 5.7 M L and had a maximum Mercalli intensity of VIII ( Severe ), causing $ 3 million in damage and injuring 10. The Enterprise-Record

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1386-711: The Feather River Canyon spotted the fire and radioed his colleagues at Rock Creek Powerhouse; they called 911 , who in turn transferred the call to the Cal Fire Emergency Communications Center (ECC) at 6:25 a.m. Additional calls to 911 followed, describing the fire as about 100 by 100 feet (30 by 30 m) in area, underneath the electrical transmission lines on the north side of the North Fork Feather River. By 6:31 a.m., Cal Fire had notified firefighters at Fire Station 36 (located near Concow/Jarbo Gap) of

1449-426: The Paradise region were awarded $ 5 million in grants from the fire prevention programs to pay for fuel reduction and education projects. Despite years of fuel reduction funded by special fees, numerous wildfires ravaged wildland–urban communities. Investigations found that PG&E power line failures during high winds had caused many of the fires. Utilities have the ability to disable dangerous power lines; however,

1512-562: The Record were among many newspapers that were published in Chico in the 1860s. Other publications included the Chico Index, Chico Courant and the California Caucasian . The Caucasian was reportedly a central force in fomenting the atmosphere of hate and bigotry which led to the burning of Chico's then-"Chinatown" in 1877 ( https://web.archive.org/web/20110718035004/http://www.what-you-see.com/calif/chico.htm ). Ultimately,

1575-493: The Western United States were deployed to fight the fire. In the first week, the fire burned tens of thousands of acres per day. Containment on the western half was achieved when the fire reached primary highway and roadway arteries that formed barriers. In the second week the fire expanded by several thousand acres per day along a large uncontained fire line. Each day, containment increased by five percent along

1638-768: The acquisition of the Chico Chronicle became the Chico Morning Chronicle-Record. The name was winnowed back to Chico Record after new owners purchased the paper in 1897. The Chico Enterprise originated in 1859 as the Tehama Tocsin in Tehama, California . It relocated to Red Bluff, California and, later, to Chico where it was renamed the Northern Enterprise. The name was later shorted to the Enterprise. The Enterprise and

1701-498: The air so turbulent that fire retardant drops were impossible. The air tanker returned to base 45 minutes later, still fully loaded. Cal Fire made two more attempts to send air tankers, both of which were unsuccessful. While helicopters—better able to fly beneath the thick smoke—were able to drop water on evacuation routes over the course of the day, fixed-wing aircraft were grounded until the winds slowed. By 7:48 a.m. people began calling 911 to report widespread spot fires on

1764-693: The best outcomes, with some pointing to Australia's policy discouraging them, instituted following the 1983 Ash Wednesday brushfires in which many of the 75 dead were killed while trying to evacuate. However, 70 of the 84 fatalities listed in the Butte County District Attorney's Camp Fire investigation summary occurred inside or immediately outside the victim's residences, indicating that failure to evacuate contributed to many more deaths (70) than occurred while evacuating (8). Many seniors were evacuated by passersby and neighbors, with at least one account of dozens of evacuees jumping into

1827-493: The communities of Butte Valley , Chico , Forest Ranch , Helltown , Inskip , Oroville , and Stirling City . The community of Concow and the town of Paradise were destroyed within the first six hours of the fire, losing an estimated 95 percent of their buildings. The town of Magalia also suffered substantial damage, and the community of Pulga , California suffered some. Nearly 19,000 buildings were destroyed, most of them homes, along with five public schools in Paradise,

1890-461: The community of Concow. Incident command requested that an evacuation warning be issued for Concow at 7:22 a.m. Buildings in the town began to burn by 7:25 a.m, and five minutes later Concow residents began calling 911 to report fire in their yards. An evacuation order was requested for Concow at 7:37 a.m. When the main fire front impacted Concow it was between one-half and one mile (0.80 and 1.61 km) across. "Intense fire

1953-470: The community of Pulga. The tower had two arms, each with a hook hanging from a hole in a long piece of metal. The hook held up a string of electrical insulators . The transmission power lines were suspended from these insulators, away from the steel tower itself so as to prevent electricity arcing between them. One of the hooks on the tower (about three inches (7.6 cm) wide and one inch (2.5 cm) in diameter) had been worn down by rubbing against

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2016-572: The day of the start of the Camp Fire, they were setting records for the date. The National Fire Danger Rating System had four reporting stations in Butte County. On November 8, all of them reported fire danger ratings of "Very High" or "Extreme". At the time of the fire's ignition, an upper-level atmospheric ridge (an elongated region of high pressure ) was positioned off the coast of California. Its placement, allowing for northerly atmospheric flow, created an east–west pressure gradient . At

2079-501: The eastern side of Paradise, 7.5 miles (12 km) from the Camp Fire's origin above the Poe Dam. At least 30 spot fires ignited within Paradise over the following 40 minutes. Until roughly this point, the three on-duty 911 dispatchers in Paradise had been unaware of any evacuation orders or direct threat to Paradise from the fire. Dozens of people reported ash and smoke between 7:10 a.m. and 7:40 a.m., and all were told that

2142-659: The editor of the Enterprise-Record took a photo of Camp Fire , then consuming Paradise, California . The iconic photograph, taken with an iPhone camera, appeared on the websites of the New York Times , Washington Post , and Time magazine. The Los Angeles Times would later run an article detailing the efforts taken by the little paper to cover the tragedy, recognizing the staff for performing at "the highest of levels." Camp Fire (2018) The 2018 Camp Fire in Northern California 's Butte County

2205-432: The energized power line struck the transmission tower. This created an electric arc between the power line and the tower, which reached temperatures estimated at 5,000 to 10,000 °F (2,760 to 5,540 °C) and melted metal components of the conductor and the tower. The molten metal fell into the brush beneath the tower, setting it alight. At about 6:20 a.m., a PG&E employee driving eastbound on Highway 70 in

2268-399: The fire at Concow Road. At the same time, one fire engine was dispatched to Pulga and began door-to-door evacuations. By 6:51 a.m., the Camp Fire had burned about ten acres (four ha). The fire crested the ridge above the Feather River Canyon "shortly after" 7:00 a.m., and about ten minutes later, it had burned 200–300 acres (81–121 ha) and was spreading rapidly towards

2331-611: The fire started, PG&E employees noted the Big Bend's line equipment on the ground. On November 10, an estimate placed the number of structures destroyed at 6,713, which surpassed the Tubbs Fire as the most destructive wildfire in California history, but that has since been updated to 18,793. By November 15, 5,596 firefighters, 622 engines, 75 water tenders, 101 handcrews , 103 bulldozers, and 24 helicopters from all over

2394-547: The fire was north of Concow near Highway 70. At 7:50 a.m., a caller reporting "spot fires all over" was told that there were "no evacuations at this point." Nevertheless, the dispatchers began telling those callers from the far northeastern corner of Paradise to evacuate. The dispatchers learned of the Butte County Fire Department's orders to evacuate the entire town shortly after 8:00 a.m. and then began instructing all callers that they were under

2457-560: The fire. By 6:35 a.m., two fire engines had left the station and were en route via Highway 70. They stopped above Poe Dam , on the opposite side of the Feather River, to survey the fire. At 6:44 a.m., the fire captain made an initial report to the Cal Fire ECC, describing the fire's inaccessibility and prospective growth. We have eyes on the vegetation fire. It’s going to be very difficult access; Camp Creek Road

2520-530: The first week, nearly ten victims per day were found. In the second week, that lowered to several victims per day. Victims were still being found in the third week and beyond. Identification of the deceased was hampered by the fragmentary condition of many bodies. Ten of 18 dentists in Paradise lost their offices and patient records in the fire. Two of the dead were identified from the serial numbers on artificial joints, 15 from dental records, five from fingerprints and 50 from DNA. Funerals and benefits were delayed by

2583-538: The ground". The fee was suspended and repealed by the California State Legislature in July 2017. Initially, much of the fire-fee revenue funded existing fire programs; the process of building out new prevention programs was slow, but the revenue did fund projects such as secondary evacuation routes and fuel reduction zones. In August 2018, three months before the fire, fire safe councils in

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2646-512: The identification difficulties. As of 2022, a few victims are still unidentified and are undergoing testing and identification by the DNA Doe Project . Traffic jams on the few evacuation routes led to cars being abandoned while people evacuated on foot, but did not contribute to any deaths. At least seven deaths occurred when the fire overtook people who were trapped in their vehicles, most on Edgewood Road, as well as one person outside

2709-504: The line are original to the Upper North Fork Feather River Project , which was constructed in the early 1900s. A 2009 inspection noted three-bolt connectors, used to join two conductors, were in need of replacement, which PG&E said had been done by 2016. In a 2011 audit, the CPUC found several thousand deficiencies, some of which PG&E disputed; it was not clear if the number of deficiencies on

2772-564: The link to point directly to the intended article. Retrieved from " https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Enterprise-Record&oldid=932816382 " Category : Disambiguation pages Hidden categories: Short description is different from Wikidata All article disambiguation pages All disambiguation pages Chico Enterprise-Record The paper has a circulation of less than 10,000 and also publishes supplements, like "The North Valley Employment Guide", "The Real Estate Guide", "HomeStyle Magazine." Editions of

2835-531: The metal plate that it hung from, to the point where only a few millimeters of metal remained. At 6:15 a.m. PST on Thursday, November 8, a PG&E control center in Vacaville recorded an outage on the company's transmission line in the Feather River Canyon. The hook—which was about 7/8ths worn through—had snapped under the weight of the power line and insulator string that it supported, which weighed more than 142 pounds (64 kg). No longer held up,

2898-457: The most part never attempted to prevent the flames from entering Concow or Paradise, and instead sought to help people get out alive. According to Chief Scott McLean of Cal Fire , "Pretty much the community of Paradise is destroyed, it's that kind of devastation. The wind that was predicted came and just wiped it out." The first hours saw a cascade of failures in the emergency alert system, rooted in its patchwork, opt-in nature, and compounded by

2961-463: The nearly 100-year-old transmission lines required intentional manual effort. PG&E shut off residential power to some customers, particularly in Paradise, in the days leading up to the fire. Following the 2017 North Bay fires , PG&E adopted a policy that precluded shutting off lines carrying more than 115 kV due to the number of customers who would be adversely affected by such a shutdown. The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC)

3024-487: The next two hours. By 4:00 a.m. on November 8, a remote automated weather station east of Paradise was recording sustained 32-mile-per-hour (51 km/h) winds and 52-mile-per-hour (84 km/h) gusts. By the time of the Camp Fire's ignition, the Jarbo Gap weather station was recording 18-mile-per-hour (29 km/h) winds out of the northeast with 40-mile-per-hour (64 km/h) gusts. The relative humidity level

3087-425: The recent rain. Over a thousand firefighters remained to search for any smoldering fires near the contained perimeter, clear roadways of debris and hazardous burned trees, and help with search and recovery efforts. There were a large number of fatalities in the first several hours of the fire, but they were not found quickly. Discovery of these early fatalities took place over the course of the following two weeks. In

3150-551: The roads out of Paradise were only capable of evacuating around a fourth of the population within two hours. Residential development into wilderness areas, known as wildland–urban interface , requires increased state resources to safeguard these communities. To recuperate associated costs, California imposed a special fee on property owners in WUI zones, however the fee was largely unpopular, with assemblyman Devon Mathis (Republican) claiming "not one cent has gone to putting more boots on

3213-515: The same time, a shortwave trough (a smaller-scale 'kink' of low pressure embedded in the flow) was moving over California, acting to intensify the pressure gradient. This created katabatic winds in many valleys in the western Sierra Nevada. Such winds form when the cool, high pressure airmass in the Great Basin spills through the narrow canyons that cut through the Sierra as it moves towards

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3276-577: The single digits and wind gusts of up to 55 miles per hour (89 km/h). The meteorologist-in-charge at the Sacramento NWS office called it "a significant red-flag event and one of the stronger ones of the season". PG&E informed 70,000 customers, residents of Paradise among them, that the utility company was considering shutting off their power to lessen the fire risk from downed power lines. PG&E eventually decided that conditions did not warrant it. The planned outage would not have prevented

3339-408: The south. By 10:45 a.m., the fire had burned approximately 20,000 acres (8,100 ha). At some point that day, emergency shelters were established. Wind speeds approached 50 miles per hour (22 m/s), allowing the fire to grow rapidly. Most residents of Concow and many residents of Paradise were unable to evacuate before the fire arrived. Due to the speed of the fire, firefighters for

3402-491: The uncontained eastern half of the fire that expanded into open timber and high country. Heavy rainfall started on November 21, which helped contain the fire. Fire crews pulled back and let the rain put out the remaining fires while teams searched for victims. The Camp Fire was declared 100 percent contained on Sunday, November 25, having burned for 17 days. This was five days ahead of the original projection for full containment on November 30, as firefighters had been aided by

3465-467: The utility made a settlement offer of $ 13.5 billion for the wildfire victims; the offer covered several devastating fires caused by the utility, including the Camp Fire. On June 16, 2020, the utility pleaded guilty to 84 counts of involuntary manslaughter. The footprint of the Camp Fire had experienced 13 large wildfires since 1999 and 42 large wildfires since 1914. In 2008, the Humboldt Fire and

3528-527: The warmer, low pressure airmass closer to the coast. The National Weather Service (NWS) described this as a "common synoptic pattern for strong winds and very dry conditions". The NWS office in Sacramento issued a fire weather watch on November 5, which was upgraded to a red flag warning on November 6. The warning was effective for the night of Wednesday, November 7, through the morning of Friday, November 9, and it called for relative humidity levels in

3591-448: The wind slackened enough to allow fixed-wing air tankers to operate effectively. Nine air tankers operated for the next four-and-a-half hours: five S-2s , a DC-10 , and three other large air tankers. They collectively dropped more than 69,000 gallons of fire retardant on November 8 alone. Fixed-wing air tankers ceased flying at 5:30 p.m. By 6:00 p.m., the fire had burned not quite 55,000 acres (22,000 ha). The day after

3654-616: Was 23 percent. The Camp Fire was caused by the failure of a single metal hook attached to a PG&E transmission tower on the company's Caribou-Palermo transmission line, which carried power from hydroelectric facilities in the Sierra Nevada to the Bay Area . The tower, a little under 100 feet (30 m) tall, was built on a steep incline on a ridge above Highway 70 and the North Fork Feather River near

3717-598: Was both hotter and drier than average, allowing for 'fine fuels' such as grass to carry over from the previous year. A third consecutive above-average grass crop developed following a warm and wet March 2018. This was followed by the cessation of rain in late April, and a hot and dry summer in Northern California. Paradise received only 0.88 inches (2.2 cm) of rain between May 1 and mid-November, when it typically received more than seven inches (18 cm). The U.S. Drought Monitor had logged Butte County in

3780-493: Was contained on Sunday, November 25, after burning 153,336 acres (62,050 ha). The Camp Fire caused 85 fatalities, displaced more than 50,000 people, and destroyed more than 18,000 structures, causing an estimated $ 16.5 billion in damage. It was the most expensive natural disaster (by insured losses) of 2018. PG&E filed for bankruptcy in January 2019, citing expected wildfire liabilities of $ 30 billion. On December 6, 2019,

3843-565: Was the deadliest and most destructive wildfire in California's history. The fire began on the morning of Thursday, November 8, 2018, when part of a poorly maintained Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) transmission line in the Feather River Canyon failed during strong katabatic winds . Those winds rapidly drove the Camp Fire through the communities of Concow , Magalia , Butte Creek Canyon , and Paradise , largely destroying them. The fire burned for another two weeks, and

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3906-412: Was the introduction of a Sunday morning edition on Oct. 30, 1983. The E-R shifted to an entirely morning newspaper on Sept. 8, 1992. The Enterprise-Record also moved its operation to its current offices and printing presses at 400 E. Park Ave. on Aug. 22, 1987. The ribbon cutting included Butte County Supervisor Jane Dolan, Chico Mayor Mary Andrews and Donrey founder Donald W. Reynolds. In November 2018,

3969-430: Was widespread" throughout the town by 8:00 a.m., according to a federal report. At 7:44 a.m., spot fires began to ignite in Paradise itself, ahead of the approaching main fire front. Simultaneously, the first Cal Fire air tanker left the ground at 7:44 a.m., quickly followed by an observation plane. The pilot quickly discovered that the winds were so strong—more than 50 miles per hour (80 km/h)—and

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