Photo by ampoda
The photo above and video below is from the 2012 “Post Yule Pyre” event held at Ocean Beach on Sunday night. Put on by Friends of the Rootless Forest, the event utilizes discarded Christmas trees to create a massive bonfire.
Known to draw upwards of 200 people, the group has been holding their roast-o-tannenbaum for the last 20 years. Based on the photo above, last night’s event didn’t draw a giant crowd.
And though the bonfire created by the mass of trees is typically much larger than the allowed fires on Ocean Beach, the GGNRA and Park Police usually look the other way during the fiery event.
Sarah B.
More from Ocean Beach Bulletin
More from the SF Examiner
Bay Area air quality worst in years this winter
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2012/01/05/BAGQ1MIBLV.DTL
My thought exactly – why was this permitted when not only has air quality has caused a record number of “Spare the Air” days and forced everyone else to refrain from using their fireplaces, but also the fire danger is extremely high?
*in my wicked Bevis impression
FIRE! FIRE! FIRE!
Can’t believe I missed this. You gotta tell me these things before they happen girl.
They haven’t been turning an eye for the past couple of years. this year there were less people on the beach due to high police presence. The park police were then busy tossing half burned trees into the ocean to make sure no fun was had.
Same went for trees burned in the sanctioned fire pits as well, which were all extinguished promptly at 11 p.m.
uhh…fire danger Patrick? Really? On a beach…next to the Pacific Ocean…
It was permitted because this is not the Soviet Union (yet), and San Franciscans still know how to have a damn good (and cheap) time, but I see that the influences of the Khmer Rouge are growing when people are encouraged to rat out their neighbors if they use their fireplaces to keep warm instead of using PGE’s gas.
What is this…the Soviet Union!? Spare the Air days?! Are you kidding me? What a joke!
And the # of cars/single commuters on the road…air traffic, etc…does nothing to the air.
Just target fireplaces…yeah..that makes a hell of a lot of sense! Idiots! I mean, Idiot brothers.
There were fewer people on Sunday for several reasons.
1) Park police and Rangers were arresting attendees last year including 70 year olds.
2) Too late to participate. Most people got rid of their trees before the 8th.
3) Underground nature of the event makes it hard to find out the info like when, where, etc.
As far as Spare The Air Days – The winds were blowing offshore, so the smoke & particulates blow out to sea and do not affect people. The fire danger is minimal as it is on a sandy beach, far from flammables. My beef is with all of the half-burned tree stumps littering the beach. The cops should have just let them burn down. Your tax dollars at work = NO FUN!
Pretty sure it’s illegal to burn christmas trees on Ocean Beach. And as far as Droozle’s comment, Christmas trees are generally considered “green wood” meaning, they haven’t seasoned/dried out sufficiently enough for the treesto burn fully. Sure the pine needles go up quick enough, but nothing else. Don’t blame the cops for other people’s stupidity.