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- Written by: Elizabeth Larson
Wayne Yahnke, cofounder and treasurer of Haunted Lake County, said they are excited to put on a COVID-safe Halloween this year at the Lake County Fairgrounds, located at 401 Martin St. in Lakeport.
He said the drive-thru approach to scaring local residents received approval from Lake County Public Health.
It had its first run this past weekend and is ramping up for the finale, on Friday, Oct. 30, and Saturday, Oct. 31, Halloween night.
The event will take place from 5 to 10 p.m. both nights. From 5 to 6 p.m. is a less-scary hour for children. Adults are encouraged to come back for the show for mature audiences from 6 to 10 p.m.
On Halloween night, Yahnke said the Kiwanis Club has approval to deliver candy safely through the windows of vehicles using a PVC pipe.
Yahnke said the show this year includes the entire fairgrounds, with visitors to take a quarter-mile drive through the grounds. They’ll enter the carnival area at gate four and then be directed through the event, ultimately leaving through the main gate.
Last year, the event was threatened by public safety power shutoffs. But Yahnke said community members helped by providing generators and the show went off without a hitch.
“The power went off and nobody knew it,” he said. “We pulled off a haunted house last year with no power.”
Yahnke said it takes weeks to prepare and involves the work of up to 30 volunteers, ranging in age from 12 to 60.
“We normally start construction the weekend after Labor Day,” he said, but this year the schedule was delayed by at least a week due to Public Health approvals and other issues.
As part of getting approval from Public Health, Yahnke said they had to write up a four-page COVID-19 plan.
Once the six weeks of construction was under way, it was crunch time. “We’ve really had to reach hard to make this happen,” Yahnke said.
He said they’ve never done an event this large, and had to be even more creative than normal. One of the questions for them was how to scare people in their cars.
“We’ve come up with some pretty good stuff,” Yahnke said.
This year’s theme revolves around the fairgrounds, from the carnival to boat races to livestock, Yahnke said.
They’ve gotten support from Hillside Honda, JKL Construction, Kelseyville Lumber, Dave Furia and Furia Motorsports in getting cars, and Forrest Kuecker who transported the cars.
“The list goes on and on,” Yahnke said of the people and businesses that have stepped up to help.
This year, he said Haunted Lake County is asking for a minimum donation of $20 per car.
Haunted Lake County raised $6,000 last year that was donated to Operation Tango Mike, he said.
Yahnke said their beneficiary this year is the Lake County Fair Foundation, the nonprofit organization that supports the fairgrounds.
He said they are excited to be able to put on Halloween in some form and give families a way to avoid going out trick or treating.
They’re trying to promote the holiday as much as possible while keeping elements of safety, Yahnke said.
For more information, visit Haunted Lake County’s website and Facebook page.
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The company implemented the public safety power shutoff, or PSPS – which began on Sunday morning in some parts of the region and on Sunday afternoon in Lake County – across a large swath of PG&E’s service area.
An initial partial all-clear had been called for Lake County on Monday, with about 5 percent restored on Monday night. PG&E told Lake County News at that time that the rest of the county was set to be restored by Tuesday night.
Due to continuing high winds and dynamic weather conditions that lasted overnight Monday and into Tuesday, the weather “all clear” notification for the remaining impacted areas was issued at 1:45 p.m. Tuesday, PG&E said.
Following this all clear, PG&E crews began power restoration efforts in areas still out of power.
Ahead of restoring power, PG&E follows a protocol that involves patrolling lines and electrical equipment for damage.
PG&E said its crews have patrolled more than 17,000 miles of transmission and distribution lines using 1,800 ground patrol units, 65 helicopters and one airplane.
As of Tuesday night, PG&E said it had received 130 reports of damage or hazards to equipment – such as downed power lines or vegetation on lines – due to the high winds that moved across the region, which it said could have led to wildland fires had the PSPS not occurred.
By Tuesday night, PG&E said more than 335,000 of the approximately 345,000 customers impacted by the PSPS had power restored.
PG&E mapping indicated that by Tuesday night Lake County had power restored, with all of its community resource centers closed, according to the company’s PSPS website.
The approximately 10,000 customers still without power on Tuesday night throughout the outage area can expect to have their power restored by noon on Wednesday, PG&E officials said in a Tuesday night briefing.
Mark Quinlan, PG&E’s incident commander, said that the company doesn’t expect another PSPS for the coming week and a half.
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NORTHERN CALIFORNIA – Red flag conditions with strong wind gusts continued to test the containment lines on the August Complex South Zone this week.
The complex, which has been burning for two months after being started by lightning, remained at 1,032,648 acres on Tuesday, with containment at 93 percent, the US Forest Service reported.
It is burning in the Mendocino, Shasta-Trinity and Six Rivers National Forests.
The complex’s South Zone, which includes the Mendocino National Forest in northern Lake County, remained at 499,827 acres and 90 percent containment on Tuesday, the Forest Service said.
Additional personnel arrived at the South Zone Monday bringing the total number of people to 224. The Forest Service said 594 personnel are assigned to the complex as a whole.
Officials said the fire crews continue to focus on removing hazard trees, conducting fire suppression repair in priority areas and breaking down berms near containment lines.
On Monday, during the red flag warning, at times the northeast wind blew up to 40 miles per hour and the humidity dipped into the single digits, dropping as low as 1 percent at Mendocino Pass, the Forest Service reported.
The area of the fire that is not contained is in the Hellhole Canyon east of Covelo. This steep, dangerous terrain is not a safe place to have firefighters engaged directly with the fire, officials said.
Instead, the Forest Service said crews have worked to construct firelines on a ridge where suppression actions could be taken if it moved out of the Canyon. They have also been assisted by a helicopter dropping water on the fire when activity increases.
Throughout the duration of the August Complex, fire managers have been using distributed real time infrared, or DRTI, and fire imaging technology to support wildland firefighting operations and decision making, the Forest Service said.
Officials said DRTI is a packaged product which provides infrared video to frontline operators and near-real time perimeter maps to incident command planners. Point/spot detection in concert with high-resolution photographs make DRTI an effective detection tool.
The high altitude, high speed flight characteristics of the Air National Guard RC-26 aircraft provide the ability to fly detection missions over broad geographic areas. Wireless transfer of data from the aircraft facilitates transfer of information to ground units, according to the Forest Service report.
Utilizing the DRTI flights, firefighters can gather immediate information on heat signatures within the fire area. The Forest Services said the system can pinpoint heat signatures posing a threat to containment, allowing firefighters to quickly address those hazards and in turn decrease exposure to firefighters on the ground.
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Efforts associated with the yearlong Safer Highways Statewide grant will continue through Sept. 30, 2021.
The Safer Highways Statewide grant provides the CHP with funding to conduct additional driving under the influence saturation patrols, DUI checkpoints and traffic safety education efforts throughout the state.
Additionally, the CHP will participate in the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s Drive Sober or Get Pulled Over campaign.
“DUI is the result of poor decision-making, and too often, it has tragic consequences,” said CHP Commissioner Warren Stanley. “If you drive while impaired, you could be arrested, or worse, involved in a crash.”
In 2018, there were 566 deaths and 11,298 injuries associated with DUI crashes within the CHP’s jurisdiction.
Each one of these injuries and deaths represents a preventable tragedy and a continued need to focus efforts on reducing impaired driving, the CHP said.
The CHP reminds the public, “DUI Doesn’t Just Mean Booze.”
Alcohol, cannabis, prescription medications, illegal drugs, or any combination of these, can impair your ability to drive and will result in an arrest if you are under the influence.
Always designate a sober driver, take public transportation, or call a taxi or a ride-share service. There is always a better option than getting behind the wheel while intoxicated.
Funding for this program was provided by a grant from the Office of Traffic Safety, through National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.