Re: California Wildfires

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In California, the fast-moving Bear Fire grew unabated as one of scores of wildfires across the state. The Bear Fire, burning near Chico, destroyed dozens of homes in Butte County, where 10 people were found dead, hitting the community of Berry Creek especially hard.
Propelled by winds as strong as 45 miles an hour, the Bear Fire northeast of Oroville, Calif., has grown at explosive rates this week, causing 10 deaths as it ripped through mountain communities and forced thousands of people to evacuate.

The fire is still growing, but residents were already beginning on Thursday to learn of the damage across the 252,000 acres it has burned so far. Many will not have a home to return to. Berry Creek, a community of about 1,200 people, is largely destroyed. On Wednesday afternoon, thick smoke hung over the area and only a handful of houses were still standing. The town’s fire station and its fire truck, parked beside it, were burned. Across the street, the elementary school was destroyed.

Capt. Derek Bell said on Thursday night that the Butte County Sheriff’s Office had found an additional seven victims and was still working to locate missing people. The Bear Fire is part of the North Complex, which remains 0 percent contained and has destroyed or damaged about 2,000 structures, said Steve Kaufman, a spokesman for Cal Fire, the state firefighting agency.

Calmer winds had slowed its growth, giving officials some hope. “Winds have decreased dramatically, and hopefully that will remain over the next few days,” said Scott McLean, a spokesman for Cal Fire. Most Berry Creek residents evacuated the town in a panic early in the week as the fire charged toward them, with a narrow country road the only route to safety. More than 100 people had to be rescued Tuesday evening.

At least 200 structures in the town have been damaged, officials said, adding that they do not know the full extent of the destruction yet, and probably will not for several days. Many other small mountain communities were also affected by the fire, Mr. McLean said. Mayor Chuck Reynolds of Oroville told The Sacramento Bee on Wednesday that his city of roughly 20,000 people, which had been under an evacuation warning, had largely been spared by the fire.

Further south, the Creek Fire, near Fresno, was 6 percent contained on Thursday night, growing to more than 175,000 acres. Thousands of people evacuated their homes, emergency teams searched for injured survivors and the U.S. Forest Service closed all 18 national forests in California, fearing that people could become trapped in the parks.
Zygy Roe-Zurz, whose family lives in Berry Creek, Calif., said that his aunt was killed as the Bear Fire ripped through the community, and that his mother remained missing. Authorities told the family that Mr. Roe-Zurz’s uncle was likely dead as well, he said.

“I feel barren — this is a fathomless loss and I will never be the same,” said Mr. Roe-Zurz, 37, who is in Arkansas and last spoke to his mother on Tuesday night, before the flames intensified. “This cruel fire took everything.” He said that his family members staying at the property in Berry Creek had been under the impression that the fire was getting under control, but that the situation changed dramatically as the Bear Fire jumped an astonishing 230,000 acres overnight Tuesday into Wednesday. “It’s pretty much a nightmare scenario,” Mr. Roe-Zurz said. “I’m devastated.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/10/us/f ... state.html
"Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts." - Daniel Patrick Moynihan

Re: California Wildfires

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highdesert wrote: Fri Sep 11, 2020 12:03 pm
In California, the fast-moving Bear Fire grew unabated as one of scores of wildfires across the state. The Bear Fire, burning near Chico, destroyed dozens of homes in Butte County, where 10 people were found dead, hitting the community of Berry Creek especially hard.
It's real, kids. Luckily the winds are blowing it away from the town of Oroville. Our town of Chico is once again filled with fire refugees. Dang.

on edit 5 pm:
The August Complex, 35 miles northwest of Willows, was at 471,185 acres and 24 percent containment Thursday morning, according to a press release issued by the U.S. Forest Service. Northeast winds continued through most of the day Wednesday and there was significant fire spread from increased fire activity on the west side of the fire, with heavy smoke production across the area.

The growth makes the August Complex the largest wildfire in state history. The Great Basin Incident Management Team took over management of the fire Friday morning.
https://www.chicoer.com/2020/09/10/fire ... a-history/

CDFingers
Crazy cat peekin' through a lace bandana
like a one-eyed Cheshire, like a diamond-eyed Jack

Re: California Wildfires

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The 2020 fire season has been record-breaking, in not only the total amount of acres burned at just over 3 million, but also 6 of the top 20 largest wildfires in California history have occurred this year.
— CAL FIRE (@CAL_FIRE) September 10, 2020
On Thursday, the August Complex fire officially became the largest blaze in California history, burning more than 471,000 acres. Since then, authorities have grouped it with other fires, bringing its official acreage to more than 746,000 acres. The overall complex is only 25% contained.

The August Complex started as more than 30 separate fires in the Mendocino National Forest caused by lightning. It is burning in Glenn, Mendocino, Lake, Tehama and Trinity counties. Two other fires in the month of August have also made their way into the record books. The SCU Complex fire east of the Bay Area is now No. 3 at 396,000 acres, and the North Bay LNU fire is No. 4 with 363,000 acres burned.
Largest fires in California history:

August Complex: 471,185
Mendocino Complex (2018): 459,123
SCU Lightning Complex: 396,624
LNU Lightning Complex: 363,220
Thomas (2017): 281,893
Cedar (2013): 273,246
Rush (2012): 271,911
Rim (2013) 257,314
By far the deadliest fire occurred in Paradise in 2018. But the North Complex fire in Butte County, which includes the Bear fire, is shaping up to join the list of the deadliest, and one of the biggest, blazes in state history. As of Friday morning, it had burned 252,534 acres, with 10 deaths confirmed and more than a dozen people still missing. It burned into tiny mountain hamlets, destroying many structures.
https://www.latimes.com/california/stor ... -right-now

The Bobcat Fire near Bisbee is pouring smoke into the LA basin, one headline said it's causing the worst air pollution in 26 years. The El Dorado Fire near me has apparently merged with the fire that's been burning since July 31st. The earlier fire is contained but not extinguished.

The Creek Fire near Fresno, 175,893 acres and 6% contained.

CDF: A new invasion, stock up on brewskies.
"Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts." - Daniel Patrick Moynihan

Re: California Wildfires

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Phuuuuck guys, you have no idea how dramatic the shift in air quality has been.

This is a shot from the southern foothills looking North toward the San Gabriel mountains at the start of the fire:
8691825E-4088-48AF-B3C5-82FE13FD9FF2.jpeg
This is the same view showing what it looked like just one day after the winds shifted Southward to blow all the smoke from the Bobcat fire into the LA Basin. (The fire is burning in the very center of this photograph hidden, along with the entire mountain range, by the smoke.)
23C39D90-B69E-44C3-98CF-34D7A08AB1F2.jpeg
The photos were from a part of town that was slightly elevated and far enough East away from the path of smoke. Going downhill a bit and westward 15 min and the atmosphere changes dramatically:
5F643E07-1313-49C4-8259-6657BBF97ADA.jpeg
This is photo is mid-day, 82* F, 23% humidity, with the sun directly above unable to penetrate the haze of smoke.
"It is better to be violent, if there is violence in our hearts, than to put on the cloak of non-violence to cover impotence. There is hope for a violent man to become non-violent. There is no such hope for the impotent." -Gandhi

Re: California Wildfires

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What Bisbee said, cleverly-disguised expletive and all.

We're in eastern Ventura County about 45 miles northwest of downtown Los(t) Angeles. SWMBO and I have not seen blue skies for nearly a week. The sunsets, when the sun can penetrate at all, are a garish orangey-red. The daylight varies from yellowish-brown to brown-brown. So far the particulate matter is too high up to interfere with my already-impaired breathing, but that could change.

Re: California Wildfires

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For all of those who want a quick and inexpensive alternative to an high falutin’ air scrubber: Box-fan paired with a high-quality 20”x20”x1” (or 4” if you can find one) air filter.
183E9248-B8CC-4BDC-8060-5499F9D8D9A7.jpeg
Just one day of use and it turned from this:
A327D2AC-FED8-43F0-90C3-BEE03E491D0B.jpeg
To this:
2DB7AA50-7079-4AB1-9C4D-88EF9915ED1D.jpeg
This is in a house with new windows, no pets, tile & wood floors (no carpets).
"It is better to be violent, if there is violence in our hearts, than to put on the cloak of non-violence to cover impotence. There is hope for a violent man to become non-violent. There is no such hope for the impotent." -Gandhi

Re: California Wildfires

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Amazingly the grey skies and ash fall in Ventura and all along the CA coast that Dufus described (sorry, your handle...) is actually from the fires in Northern CA. It is smoke that is high up in the atmosphere and drops ash but isn’t particularly affecting the local air quality. None of the smoke from the Bobcat and El Dorado fires are impacting communities west of Downtown LA.
"It is better to be violent, if there is violence in our hearts, than to put on the cloak of non-violence to cover impotence. There is hope for a violent man to become non-violent. There is no such hope for the impotent." -Gandhi

Re: California Wildfires

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Bisbee wrote: Fri Sep 11, 2020 9:41 pm Amazingly the grey skies and ash fall in Ventura and all along the CA coast that Dufus described (sorry, your handle...) is actually from the fires in Northern CA. It is smoke that is high up in the atmosphere and drops ash but isn’t particularly affecting the local air quality. None of the smoke from the Bobcat and El Dorado fires are impacting communities west of Downtown LA.
Smart idea with the box fan and filters, that works. Saw no mandatory evacuations for the Bobcat Fire, but that was this morning are they still just warnings? Stay safe and healthy
"Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts." - Daniel Patrick Moynihan

Re: California Wildfires

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The governors of California and Oregon delivered blunt and alarming details on Friday about the massive wildfires that have consumed millions of acres across their two states and Washington, killing at least 17 people. State leaders also braced for that death toll to increase, with an Oregon official saying the state was preparing for a “mass fatality incident.”

Oregon, Washington and California are enduring a wildfire season of historic proportions, with the firefighting effort compounded by the coronavirus pandemic and misinformation online.
Gov. Gavin Newsom of California also noted the dying winds and said that a “modest amount” of precipitation could be on the way in his state.

In her news conference, Gov. Kate Brown of Oregon noted that well over 1 million acres of land — over 1,500 square miles — has been burned in the state and that the state’s air quality ranks the worst in the world. “Almost anywhere in the state you can feel this right now,” she said.
Sheriff Kory Honea of Butte County, Calif., lowered the death toll of the Bear Fire north of Sacramento to nine, saying that deputies had mistakenly identified an anatomical model of a skeleton as human remains.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/11/us/w ... k-1e628466
"Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts." - Daniel Patrick Moynihan

Re: California Wildfires

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Earlier this week, the North Complex fire was a dying giant that was more than half-contained, not the monster it would become. Firefighters thought a river, one crew of firefighters and one incomplete line of bare earth might keep the Northern California fire from racing toward communities like Berry Creek, officials said. At the time, firefighters said they had few options, so everyone hoped for the best.

Then the fire exploded, traveling with astounding speed into Butte County mountain communities, killing at least 12 people with more than 20 still missing, and destroying hundreds of structures. When the winds came, the firefighters were quickly overwhelmed. There are troubling parallels between this fire and the fast-moving inferno that burned down much of Paradise two years ago, killing more than 80.

Like the Camp fire in 2018, which jumped the Feather River’s north fork and charged into Paradise in 2018, powerful wind gusts of up to 50 mph carried embers from a wildfire over the Feather River, this time east over its scenic middle fork, and into the brittle conifer crowns on the other side, south of Last Chance Creek.
The North Complex spot fire became a crown fire, the most intense type of forest fire there is because of a combination of its unpredictable behavior, extreme heat and speed. All crews can do is get out of its way as it scorches trees and plants in its path from top to bottom, leaving woody skeletons in its wake. The spot fire was located about 10 a.m. Tuesday and was 500 acres by 10:30 a.m. and 1,000 acres soon after, said fire public information officer Sean Collins.
Incident records and interviews by The Times found that the protection of those in harm’s way was hindered by evacuation orders that came by surprise, went unheeded and were impaired by a power outage. Pacific Gas & Electric shut down its community resource center in Berry Creek about 2:30 p.m. because of the incoming fire, about an hour before residents there were told to leave.

“We did the best job that we could, given the resources and time that we have,” said Butte County Sheriff-Coroner Kory Honea, who has the grim job of overseeing the search for bodies. “That said, as I have said many, many times before, there is no way to guarantee 100% saturation of your message,” he added. “There’s no way to guarantee perfection. It’s particularly difficult when we’re dealing with communities in remote and rural areas that are hard to get to and sometimes have spotty coverage.”
https://www.latimes.com/california/stor ... structures
"Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts." - Daniel Patrick Moynihan

Re: California Wildfires

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Two years ago scientists warned that a massive tree die-off in the Sierra Nevada could set the stage for forest conflagrations akin to World War II fire bombings. The Creek fire, which forced the dramatic helicopter evacuations of more than 200 campers over Labor Day weekend in California, may be a hint of far worse to come in future years.

It is burning in the Sierra National Forest, an epicenter of the bark beetle attacks that killed nearly 150 million drought-stressed trees during the last decade. The U.S. Forest Service estimates that dead stands in the Creek fire contain 2,000 tons of fuel per acre.
As of Saturday, the fire had charred more than 196,000 acres, destroyed 365 structures and was threatening 14,000 more in the vicinity of Big Creek, Huntington Lake and Shaver Lake. Firefighters don’t expect to contain it until mid-October.

For those who have studied the potential fire effects of the vast beetle kill, the Creek fire is a harbinger. “I don’t want to be alarmist. But I think the conditions are there,” said Scott Stephens, a UC Berkeley professor of fire science and lead author of a 2018 paper that raised the specter of future mass forest fires as intense as the Dresden, Germany, and Tokyo firebombings. “As those [trees] continue to fall, the physics of it are unchanged. If you have dead and downed logs … the fires described in warfare are possible.”
“All of us on the paper were suggesting that if you are going to try to reduce that mass fire problem in the future, you really need to start putting prescribed fire into these stands to start whittling away at those bigger fuels,” said Forest Service research ecologist Malcolm North, one of Stephens’ eight co-authors.

While thinning — cutting down the dead timber and hauling it away — can play a role, especially around mountain communities, North said a majority of the beetle-killed stands are in wilderness or in areas that are too remote and too steep to be logged. Moreover, the dead trees have lost most of their commercial value and are of little interest to the remaining sawmills in California.
The elimination of indigenous fire practices, logging of the biggest and most fire-resistant trees and fire suppression produced an overgrown forest vulnerable to bark beetle attacks during the severe California drought of 2012-16.

Some areas have 500 to 800 trees per acre, compared with 60 to 100 pre-settlement. As North puts it, there were too many straws in the dry ground competing for water. The beetle toll was the greatest in the densest stands. There dead fuel will keep piling up for years to come.
But while the Sierra forest staff has the will to conduct 50,000 acres a year of controlled burns, Thomas said, “they don’t have the capacity and the funding to do it.”

Prescribed fire programs aren’t getting the staffing and money they need from the regional and national Forest Service offices, he said.“How many of these fire seasons do we need before we do the things we need to do?” Thomas wondered. “Every fire scientist I know has been saying it for 30 years.”
Within the agency, North said, “There’s a lot of talk. There’s a lot of attention. The prescribed fire that the Forest Service has put on the landscape has tripled over the last few years and that’s great. But we’re talking about needing to increase prescribed fire by 10 to 12 times” in the Sierra Nevada.
“The thing that is just continuing to bite us in the butt,” he added, “is that rather than being the proactive agents of fire on these landscapes, we’re kind of forcing fire” to occur under the most extreme, destructive conditions. “We’d do a lot better if we were deciding when some of these fires occur.”
Stephens figures California has another decade or so to flatten the trajectory of ever more destructive forest fires. What is needed, he said, is a combination of prescribed fire, restoration thinning and making rural communities more fire resistant.

“If we don’t come out of this year focused on that and try to move forward, I just don’t know if there’s much hope,” he said. “I’m always hopeful. But I’m getting tired.”
https://www.latimes.com/environment/sto ... rra-nevada
"Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts." - Daniel Patrick Moynihan

Re: California Wildfires

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Only small winds forecast for the next few days. Easier to fight the fires, but the smoke hangs around. >kaff kaff<

Chico is pretty good now at having things for fire refugees to buy. Retailers big and small have been laying in those supplies since March. Pandemic folks bought other stuff.

CDFingers
Crazy cat peekin' through a lace bandana
like a one-eyed Cheshire, like a diamond-eyed Jack

Re: California Wildfires

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The smoke was high here yesterday, no sun but light. Everything smells of smoke, did a lot of washing yesterday. I'm coughing and sneezing a lot, thankfully the weather has been cooler but it's heating up again.

The Apple Fire that's been burning 43 days in my county is now just a joint US Forest Service and County Fire operation, Cal Fire stepped away but still over 800 personnel assigned. It was human caused, a broken down vehicle in a grassy area ignited it. The one right next to it the El Dorado Fire started by the pyrotechnic at the gender reveal party is also still burning with almost 1500 personnel assigned.
"Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts." - Daniel Patrick Moynihan

Re: California Wildfires

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Good luck finding a filter. When I went looking 2 days ago, my local Fred Meyer was wiped out of everything but a few 16x25.
Of those few remaining, all were the high-end filters that could actually remove smoke...because they were full price!
You can see the smoke inside the stores and it's so smokey outside even my cat won't go out.
"I hope ever to see America among the foremost nations in examples of justice and liberality" - George Washington

Re: California Wildfires

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I'm trying some shop vac drywall bags taped to box fans for the hell of it. I think they are too tight to allow sufficient suction. I'll let you all know if they remain white or if they turn brown.

You can order Merv 13 filters for your furnace online. Mine will be here in about a week....

Re: California Wildfires

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highdesert wrote: Sun Sep 13, 2020 10:32 am The smoke was high here yesterday,
Same outside Oroville, where all the grows are. "Get downwind" <-- bumper sticker.

on edit: the box fan trick works because you're circulating the same air in the room, and every time it passes through the filter, some smoky shit is apprehended.

on second edit: apparently gin anesthetizes the brain so it does not think there is smoke in the air, so I may experiment. Standby.

CDFingers <-- guilty of gallows humor
Crazy cat peekin' through a lace bandana
like a one-eyed Cheshire, like a diamond-eyed Jack

Re: California Wildfires

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CDFingers wrote: Sun Sep 13, 2020 6:55 pm on second edit: apparently gin anesthetizes the brain so it does not think there is smoke in the air, so I may experiment. Standby.

CDFingers <-- guilty of gallows humor
:lol: After a very small non-controlled study (I'm on my second G&T - my limit), it seems to be working but I have a barely functional pea sized brain. It really needs to be tested on people with normal sized fully functional brains to make a definitive statement.

:)
"Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts." - Daniel Patrick Moynihan

Re: California Wildfires

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RotaryMags wrote: Sun Sep 13, 2020 8:03 pm What brand(s) of Gin?
I prefer Gilbey's and Gordon's but last Christmas I was given a bottle of Beefeater's another of Bombay and a Tanqueray. I've an unopened Gilbey's from last Christmas as well. I'll probably give most of them away this Christmas or buy some nice cocktail glasses and a wicker basket as an item for the school auction.
To be vintage it must be older than me!
The next gun I buy will be the next to last gun I ever buy. PROMISE!
jim

Re: California Wildfires

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sig230 wrote: Sun Sep 13, 2020 8:14 pm
RotaryMags wrote: Sun Sep 13, 2020 8:03 pm What brand(s) of Gin?
I prefer Gilbey's and Gordon's but last Christmas I was given a bottle of Beefeater's another of Bombay and a Tanqueray. I've an unopened Gilbey's from last Christmas as well. I'll probably give most of them away this Christmas or buy some nice cocktail glasses and a wicker basket as an item for the school auction.
Liquor is an individual taste, growing up my father never drank alcohol and my mother would have wine occasionally. My maternal grandmother loved her Gordon's Gin though. I'm not fond of juniper berries which is the predominate flavoring in many of the old reliable British gin brands i.e., Tanqueray, Beefeater's, Gordon's, Gilbey's...but I do like Bombay Sapphire which is more citrus and Diet Schweppes Tonic for a summertime G&T.

The top selling gins.
https://www.thespiritsbusiness.com/2019 ... rands-2/8/
"Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts." - Daniel Patrick Moynihan

Re: California Wildfires

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I really enjoy Tanqueray. I like it early on in the second drink where your lips get numb and you know you probably shouldn't have ordered that second one, so you buy another round.

CDFingers
Crazy cat peekin' through a lace bandana
like a one-eyed Cheshire, like a diamond-eyed Jack

Re: California Wildfires

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highdesert wrote: Sun Sep 13, 2020 8:34 pm
sig230 wrote: Sun Sep 13, 2020 8:14 pm
RotaryMags wrote: Sun Sep 13, 2020 8:03 pm What brand(s) of Gin?
I prefer Gilbey's and Gordon's but last Christmas I was given a bottle of Beefeater's another of Bombay and a Tanqueray. I've an unopened Gilbey's from last Christmas as well. I'll probably give most of them away this Christmas or buy some nice cocktail glasses and a wicker basket as an item for the school auction.
Liquor is an individual taste, growing up my father never drank alcohol and my mother would have wine occasionally. My maternal grandmother loved her Gordon's Gin though. I'm not fond of juniper berries which is the predominate flavoring in many of the old reliable British gin brands i.e., Tanqueray, Beefeater's, Gordon's, Gilbey's...but I do like Bombay Sapphire which is more citrus and Diet Schweppes Tonic for a summertime G&T.

The top selling gins.
https://www.thespiritsbusiness.com/2019 ... rands-2/8/
It was January 1969 and I was designing the early cable tv systems out of the corporate offices on Little Santa Monica Blvd. We had all volunteered to help with cleanup of the ducks and other shore critters over the weekend and still kinda smelled like La Brea. For lunch we headed over to the Hamburger Hamlet for a Chili Size and cocktails. A couple of us ordered martinis and when they served them we all simply broke out laughing. Al called the waiter over and asked "What is that?" "Why a martini. Is there a problem?" "Yes", said Al. We wanted LA Martinis. Those are Santa Monica Martinis. They are leaking oil!"

It seems the chef had a great idea and so had stuffed the olives with anchovies. Needless to say, we all switched to Manhattans.
Last edited by sig230 on Sun Sep 13, 2020 9:13 pm, edited 1 time in total.
To be vintage it must be older than me!
The next gun I buy will be the next to last gun I ever buy. PROMISE!
jim

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