When Everything Around You Is Burning
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3.9 • 1.1K Ratings
🗓️ 22 September 2020
⏱️ 20 minutes
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Summary
Megan Brown’s family has worked their land in Northern California for 170 years. Fire was always a normal part of the ecosystem but Megan says, in recent years, “it’s become a monster.”
Guest: Megan Brown, rancher from Northern California
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | In the last few weeks, Megan Brown has noticed her animals have started to cough. |
| 0:10.5 | Megan's a rancher, raises cattle and hogs in Northern California. |
| 0:15.3 | It's the air that's making her animals sick, or more precisely, the smoke. |
| 0:21.0 | Megan's just a few miles from the North complex fires, which were touched off by a lightning |
| 0:25.9 | storm back in August. |
| 0:27.9 | We've only had one clear day for about a month. |
| 0:31.8 | So our house, it's like fog. |
| 0:33.5 | It's just everything is enveloped in this smoky fog. |
| 0:37.4 | And like the water troughs for my animals where they drink, all covered in a It's just everything is enveloped in this smoky fog. |
| 0:42.5 | And like the water troughs for my animals where they drink, all covered in a layer of ash. |
| 0:45.2 | Our vehicles just covered in ash. |
| 0:48.5 | I have a garden and it's just white. |
| 0:50.5 | Everything's covered in ash. |
| 0:52.6 | And it is surreal. |
| 0:53.8 | Sounds apocalyptic. |
| 0:56.8 | It is. It's like I feel like I'm on Mars. |
| 1:06.9 | Megan is the kind of rancher who will tell you all about the swimming pool she built for her pigs. |
| 1:13.6 | She grew up on this farm. On land, her family's worked for 170 years. She knows the place so well that she can tell what season it is by smell. The fall, she says, smells like tarweed. |
| 1:20.6 | And fire season. That is a smell too. |
| 1:23.6 | It smells like campfire. And unfortunately, these fires have ruined camping and campfire for me. |
| 1:30.3 | Like, it just smells like fear now. |
| 1:36.2 | When I reached Megan, she was in the middle of making meatloaf for her aunt and uncle |
... |
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