Pneumonic Plague in L.A.  Can pplague be hemorrhagic?  For that matter has it been in the U.S. And closer to my once home turf- has it been to California?

Yes, to all the above. But we will have to do a little time travel for this one- back to 1924

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/booster_shots/2009/08/pneumonic-plague-los-angeles-.html

The recap begins: "On October 29, 1924, a physician requested an ambulance from the Los Angeles
County General Hospital for Two Mexican patients critically ill of a malady which he could not definitely diagnose, but which he knew to be highly contagious since several others in the neighborhood were also affected with similar symptoms of very high fever and pains in the back and chest. The following day 13 other cases displaying the same symptoms were detected and subsequently admitted to the hospital,
where they all developed signs of severe pneumonia, with bloody expectoration and marked cyanosis."

http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dvbid/plague/info.htm

Well.. there is a modern CFR as of 1980 of a least the regular plague- looks like 15%- way above the 5-10% quoted throughout the net and this is from CDC.

• There is no plague in Australia.
• There is no plague in Europe; the last reported cases occurred after World War II.
• In Asia and extreme southeastern Europe, plague is distributed from the Caucasus Mountains in Russia, through much of the Middle East, eastward through China, and then southward to Southwest and Southeast Asia, where it occurs in scattered, localized foci. Within these plague foci, there are isolated human cases and occasional outbreaks. Plague regularly occurs in Madagascar, off the southeastern coast of Africa.
• In Africa, plague foci are distributed from Uganda
• comment: Uganda -birthplace for high path things  how about Feb 2009-
• http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/12/071207-ebola-video-ap.html
• oh well- so much for that one- link killed.
• south on the eastern side of the continent, and in southern Africa. Severe outbreaks have occurred in recent years in Kenya, Tanzania, Zaire, Mozambique, and Botswana, with smaller outbreaks in other East African countries. Plague also has been reported in scattered foci in western and northern Africa.
• In North America, plague is found from the Pacific Coast eastward to the western Great Plains and from British Columbia and Alberta, Canada southward to Mexico. Most of the human cases occur in two regions; one in northern New Mexico, northern Arizona, and southern Colorado, another in California, southern Oregon, and far western Nevada.
• In South America, active plague foci exist in two regions; the Andean mountain region (including parts of Bolivia, Peru, and Ecuador) and in Brazil.

conclusion:

Now it may be time to see if the United States are as capable of controlling the Black Death, a cat in Colorado has tested positive for pneumonic plague the Vail Daily reports. So far residents of Eagle County in Colorado have only been given advice on avoiding regular bubonic plague which is transmitted through flea bites, and no quarantine has been set up.

Pneumonic plague is especially deadly as it can kill within 24 hours and is transmitted through the air in coughs and sneezes.