Fierce winds keep Calif. wildfire danger high
Gusts in bone-dry Southern Calif. have firefighters on alert.
Once flames met ferocious winds, fire crews were mostly powerless to stop infernos that have destroyed more than 750 buildings.
FALLBROOK, CALIF. — Firefighters in Southern California were on high alert for dangerous fire potential even before the first blazes broke out.
But once flames met ferocious winds, fire crews were mostly powerless to stop infernos that destroyed more than 750 buildings, killed dozens of horses and forced hundreds of thousands of people to run from six outof-control fires that have burned over 270 square miles since Monday.
“The crews were trying to stay out ahead of this as quickly as they could,” said Capt. Kendal Bortisser of the California Department of Forestry and Fire Prevention. “As we know, when a tornado hits the Midwest, there’s no stopping it. When a hurricane hits the East Coast, there’s no stopping it. When Santa Ana winds come in, there’s no stopping them.”
Firefighters gained ground on all the fires and most evacuees were allowed to return home. President Donald Trump issued an emergency declaration allowing counties affected by the wildfires to receive federal assistance.
Yet danger persisted. Vegetation is bone dry, there’s been hardly any rainfall and winds were expected to gust up to 50 mph over the weekend in the Los Angeles and Ventura areas, the National Weather Service said.
Fires have taken people by surprise over a large swath of Southern California since the biggest fire broke out Monday evening in Ventura County, where the only death attributed to the fires, so far, involved a 70-year-old woman who was found dead in a wrecked car on a designated evacuation route in the small city of Santa Paula.
Gov. Jerry Brown planned to survey damage from the Ventura fire Saturday and meet with emergency management officials and residents. That fire has destroyed more than 500 homes and buildings and burned more than 230 square miles as it spread to beach communities and into rugged mountains, a preserve for endangered condors.
Three people were burned trying to escape a fast-moving fire that started Thursday 50 miles north of San Diego that overran a race horse training facility and a mobile home community.
More than a third of the Rancho Monserate Country Club’s 213 mobile homes burned as fire zigzagged along a hillside, skipping some streets and razing others. On one street, all 24 mobile homes were gone, with only hulls of cars and twisted metal remaining.