Collection of Random Thoughts

California Fires I have been only cursorily following the forest fires for the past four years in California. My naive, un-scientific impression is that these fires are getting worse each year and that the government isn't doing enough to avoid the extent of damage each year. The rationale for these fires provided by the govt. each year seems to vary: it is corporations that don't take preventive care of their equipment or act of nature. It felt like the govt. was more keen on just passing the blame elsewhere, do nothing about it and then largely declare emergency each year and spent billions of dollars on mitigation. I have often wondered if the govt. could do something proactively: like investing in placing lightning arrestors or identify some strategic points in the forests and place smoke sensors to alert the fire agencies very early in the fire or something else rather than just doing "containment" of fires once they start. So I started exploring what if anything...