Texas Wildfires!!

[Cinderella]

I found out last night that my Dad and his Wife and my Brother who lives 2 miles from them all had to evacuate their homes because of the wildfires near Austin. My Dad's house was spared but not his neighbors and I haven't heard from my brother yet. I knew it was close to Austin I just didn't know it was that close burning up over 1,000 houses.

I hope everyone else on here is safe down there. I saw that the fire already killed 3 people.

Here are some pictures circulating from the fire down there taken by a storm chaser.

Image 1

Image 2

[Momo]

I cannot get over how parched TX is...and how saturated other states are! I sure hope & pray all of our iMSN families & loved ones are spared!

[ladymoreta]

It's just awful. And they're having to move a lot of livestock, too.

[DCJenn]

I was out this morning at our northernmost facility and you could definitely smell the fires. We haven't had decent rain in months. They said the Austin wildfires were started by teenaged arsonists.

There's an article out this morning that our fabulous governor and legislature agreed to cut 75% of the state funds that go for volunteer fire companies in rural areas. Nice.

There were fires on the northside of San Antonio over the weekend- the winds were crazy which sparked all kinds of brush fires and one just took off before anyone knew it.

I'm very glad I live in a brick house with a metal roof!

jenn

[v-girl]

We can smell the smoke outside. North of Dallas. We haven't watered our backyard to save water. It's all yellow. Our two large 25 year old trees are dead.

Yes, it's bad, but so bad in tg Hill Country (around Austin) because of all the open spaces.

[ladymoreta]

Here's a short article about the fires from Monday: http://www.redstate.com/moe_lane/201...ire-situation/. This is a picture from the article showing the fires and smoke cover:

I'm not sure why it's so small... You can click on it to see it bigger.

wildfires.jpg

[Thirteen]

We can smell it here, too. If serious rain doesn't come, I fear this trend will continue.

[SoonerTexan]

We saw the smoke coming back from Houston this weekend. We got caught by a fire earlier this summer that closed I-45 and had to take a 1 hour detour.

Come on Tropical Storm Maria or Potential Storm #1 with a 70% chance (via stormpulse.com)

[Pollyanna]

[MarissaNicole]

Cinderella have you heard from your brother yet?

[Cinderella]

Not yet. I wish that dang boy would call or text me.

ETA: I just called and woke him up. He's fine. The house didn't burn down. The baby is alright. Everyone is ok and now he's going back to sleep. He works the night shift and is raising a toddler now.

[ladymoreta]

I thought this was a good visual of one of my parents' ponds back in April compared to this past weekend. It's all but dried up, and the grass is gone. There is still some green out there, but it's mostly inedible shrubs, so Dad is feeding his cattle bagged food.


IMG_6958.jpgIMG_5795.jpg

[Cinderella]

That's a good comparison Laurie. I saw this amazing video earlier today of how fast the wildfire spread in Bastrop, TX.

I found the video later online at this site. You'll have to watch a commercial first.

[bokelley]

Brian Williams had a piece on the fires tonight. It was kids saying how sad and scared they were. This little boy was saying how he lost his doggie. Oh my the tears were flowing.

[peggyfromwastate]

So terrible.