JULY 25, 2005

Hank A. Howard Report Re: BORever Resorts aka Pleasure Cove Marina (PCM),  Management & Operations

July 21, 2005: CDF Fire Prevention and CDF County Fire Marshal has been contacted as well as the Spanish Flat station. I contacted Capt. Tina Anderson and Berryessa Area Batt. Chief Scott Kuhn

Spanish Flat CDF station is the initial response unit from CDF.  Capt. Anderson best estimated time from dispatch to arrival is about 20-25 minutes. They must come from Spanish Flat CDF station on Berryessa-Knoxville road to Turtle Rock, past Moskowite Corners and then on CA 128 to Wragg canyon road to the Pleasure Cove gate.

I related to Capt. Tina Anderson the following matters:

1. Overcrowding in excess of 700 people, of course lots of families and children, campers, RV users, etc.

2. Lack of security and fire readiness measures, no paid security team

3. Lack of on-site control and management presence, no identification of workers

4. Entrance control points at the gate were abandoned on Saturday and Sunday and would not have anybody at entrance points to show CDF crews how to arrive at an emergency point

5. Lack of visual control - RV parking in the Brooks Circle West area right against brush and under trees. This is in a High Hazard Fire Zone and should not be allowed. It is a one-way in process and very crowded mostly because it was shaded.

6. Interface problems with campers right against the brush areas and tree canopy, oaks and sycamore trees as exposure. People were cooking in the close vicinity to tree canopy.

7. Uncontrolled parking problems, “helter- skelter” pickup and boat trailer parked anyway and everywhere, some places the pickup’s were parked nose to nose (front to front with trailers on them. in an evacuation this would be paramount to a disaster.

8. Road access was blocked near trailer unit 75, near the top far end of resort. Several pinch point exist that a Class II or Class III CDF fire trucks would not fit through. Double parked vehicles in trailer areas on both sides of the service road with boat and pickup trailers. Cars parked on both sides of road in occupied long-term trailers areas. A fire truck would not fit in the narrow opening.

9. Inspected a fire hose cabinet on the road below Unit 90 and found it unserviceable and the valve appears to be rusty and non-serviceable. Covered partially with brush.

10. Fire extinguishers were missing from the gas docks and stores, possibly in the store behind the sales counter.

11. There is not a defensible clearance zone between the brush and the camping locations.

12. There were over 150 pickup-boat trailer and connected combinations, campers and combinations parked along upper and lower roads. Blocking ingress/egress.

13. The commercial business sign off CA Highway 128 is substandard and faded, incoming CDF units would not have a clue there was a resort at that location, especially at nighttime.

14. The signage in the resort as far as trailer spaces does not meet fire code and uniformity, size. Many are non-existent.

15. There are abandoned trailers (with graffiti) and windows removed in the area next to occupied units, attractive nuisance and imminent fire threat to vandalism and arson. They need an immediate order to remove them from the site.

16. Signage on the property is non-existent and emergency responders could not respond accordingly to specific areas.

17. Non-maintained speed bumps , excessive amount ( 36 plus)  of them and would impede response from CDF units inside the resort.

18. No control in camping areas and camps sites as far as separation and aisles for access, evidence of open fires in the campground areas without fire rings, open air cooking in high hazard fire zone. The Pleasure Cove Marina resort store is selling firewood bundles.

19. Minimal water pressures available and no fire hydrants are provided on site? There are a few standpipes Class III but totally inaccessible, hose rotted and no nozzles. It is questionable as the available water pressure in the Class III standpipes. The resort fails to meet minimum CDF water requirements 2 hour, 1000 gpm, storage of 120, 0000 gallons on site, major issue with the amount of people and trailers at this resort.

20.One-way roads not posted and lack of egress.

20. I visualize a severe problem in regards to resort site evacuation. It would be a disaster in the wings waiting to happen. The inability to evacuate could be complex. The resort has no method to alert the people of a problem of a major emergency. Visually only a "candle moth" theory from wild land fire would get there attention. There are a lot of children, people in camps and Outback dirt camping severely at risk on high impact weekends.

21. I have a major concern for the safety of long-term trailer owners, visitors, and campers. I am serious about this in regards to their ability to evacuate since most of the long-term trailers left are in the north end of the resort. A wildland fire in the Wragg Canyon entrance road could cut-off escape or egress from the resort. This should be a major concern if the resort is impacted as it was last Sunday.

22. It would be interesting to find out what the reported gate count was for the weekend and a number of paid boat launches, and campers arriving for campgrounds and RV’s allowed on site.

23. I will be in contact with Kate Dargan the Napa County Fire Marshal a CDF employee and also the Area Batt. Chief Scott Kuhn tomorrow when he comes on duty. I have made these observations known to Capt. Anderson at Spanish Flat and will update them with my observations and email the three CDF Fire Officers at Lake-Napa County Ranger Unit HQ.

24.I are awaiting a call back from Kate Dargan the Fire Marshal as she is away. Will update you on that conversation.

25. A hammerhead or approved CDF turnout, 45’ radius is not available in this resort at the far north end and could negate a Class III engine turning around. This matter was known as far back  in Klienfelder Engineer Report of 2002. It could seriously trap your CDF people in the upper part of the resort and require a great degree of effort to get out of the upper end trailer units.

26. There is a gated access to the northern area where the former “Outback” was located. In the new contract with Forever Resorts they are allowing this new company to re-open that area. See contract provisions in section 2 A. 2. e. This will be an exceptional challenge for CDF if something goes wrong in that Outback Area.

27. There are more specific areas totally out of compliance.  One is a Storage Area A and/or Storage Area B corporation yard with an array of decrepit vehicles, it is fenced but has oil drums, trash, dunnage, junk cars and trailers, and construction items. Another area is near the gate into the Outback; which is loaded with large timbers removed from the shoreline and an attractive nuisance. They have been there for over 5 years since the clean up of the outback area was begun under BOR supervision. There is a D-8 bulldozer that appears to be abandoned and not usable at the far end of the resort.

28. The marina dock was identified in the Klienfelder Report as non-code compliant. Attached here is the slice from Section 9 on the fueling dock. I scanned this out of the document It is available on the BOR web site. Klienfelder is a huge file on the BOR web site and has infrastructure information on all resorts. It is well done and credible and may be of use to you and your planning strategies

9.7.2 Fueling Services

There is one fuel dock here with a two dispensers. There is a store located on the fuel dock with an attendant for issuing gasoline to boats. The fueling dock is located at the end of a boat dock. There are two storage tanks on shore. One tank holds unleaded premium gasoline and the other tank holds unleaded regular gasoline. The tanks are piped to the two dispensers on the dock. The dispensers have two hoses with service station type nozzles. Each hose has a fuel cartridge type filter. 

There are two dock storage tanks located on shore. This is flat unpaved gravel area adjacent to a paved road.. The tanks are located about 30 feet from the road. The storage tanks are above grade, horizontal, rectangular, steel, double wall tanks that sit on a common concrete slab. One tank capacity is 2,000 gallons and stores premium unleaded gasoline. The other tank capacity is 1,000 gallons and stores regular unleaded gasoline. The tank appurtenances include a primary vent, emergency vent, and product dispensing pump, sight gauge, fill line and vapor recovery line. Each tank has stairs for access to the fill nozzle. There is no leak detection monitoring system for the tank. There is no containment parking area for the tank truck. 

Each tank has a 4-inch vapor line coupler, a large vertical cone with cover attached to the fill nozzle to catch spills from the filling hose and a 2 inch product dispensing pump. The pump dispensing line does not contain an on/off solenoid valve. The pump discharge lines reduce to 1- 1/2-inch lines and the lines are routed toward the fueling dock underground. The lines are tape wrapped galvanized threaded pipe. The underground piping is not double wall piping. The lines come out of the ground near the fueling dock and are connected to two hose reels. Two hoses are routed down the shoreline to the boat dock. A connection is made on the dock to galvanized steel piping which is located in a piping trough in the walkway of the boat dock. A hose connection is made again to the fueling dock steel piping at the end of the walkway. The piping to the two dispensers is routed under the fueling dock. Shut off valves are located at the hose connections. 

C40368601\fld2r045 copyright 2002 kleinfelder, ~p. 

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