A small fire broke out Thursday along the beachside cliffs near Hope Ranch in Santa Barbara, but officials say it wasn’t caused by human activity or equipment.
Instead, experts point to a rare natural phenomenon beneath the coastal bluffs, nicknamed the "Hope Ranch volcano."
According to University of California, Santa Barbara professor Dr. David Valentine, the fire was sparked by a chemical reaction underground.
“The same thing that creates the oil that is being pumped from offshore, then we have these minerals that have iron and sulfur that are not essentially stable in the presence of oxygen,” Valentine said. “When oxygen penetrates into the bluffs, it reacts with these minerals.”
Valentine, a professor of Microchemistry and Geochemistry, said these elements can happen unpredictably beneath the surface and have been occurring for centuries, at least.
“When the early explorers came along the California coast, they actually thought there were habitations in the Santa Barbara area because there were many of these fires, and they thought they were campfires,” he said.
While the fires are typically small, Valentine noted they can raise air quality concerns.
“If you’ve ever smelled the smoldering, it smells like burning plastic, and that can’t be good if you’re inhaling that on a regular basis,” he said.
Efforts to prevent such fires have been considered but are largely ineffective, he added.
“There have been thoughts to put soil and bury it, which insulates it in some way, but it’s not going to help,” Valentine said.
The Santa Barbara County Fire Department reported no major damage associated with Thursday’s fire, but it did cause smoldering in an underground PVC drainage pipe.
Though unpredictable, Valentine said the phenomenon is a distinctive feature of the region.
“While the fires may be random, they are unique to Santa Barbara,” he said, adding that it’s something that “makes us special.”
