Fire season starts with blazes in the region

Firefighters battled blazes in San Mateo and Alameda counties over the weekend, after containing several other fires that burned hundreds of acres in the Bay Area over the past several days.

Cal Fire's incident map shows five “active fires of interest” around the state as of Sunday morning, two of which were burning in the counties that surround the San Francisco Bay.

Between Pleasanton and Sunol in Alameda County, the Canyon Fire was 75% contained as of Sunday morning and has burned 71 acres. This fire caused a few hundred homes to be evacuated Thursday, but residents were allowed to return by that evening.

The Edgewood Fire, which has been burning in San Mateo County since early last week, was 98% contained by the end of the week and had burned 20 acres. It also triggered evacuation warnings earlier last week.

Firefighters over the weekend managed to fully contain the Scenic Fire, which started as a brush fire on Thursday in Contra Costa County and burned 120 acres. An evacuation warning was issued in Port Costa on Thursday when the fire burned dangerously close to homes, but authorities gave the “all-clear” for residents to return later that day.

Several other wildfires have burned around the Bay Area in the past few days.

The Kirker Fire in Contra Costa County was 100% contained by Friday evening after burning 90 acres. The Tesla Fire, south of Livermore, started Thursday evening and burned over 500 acres but was 100% contained by Saturday morning.

Smoke has been visible in many parts of the Bay Area after hundreds of acres have burned recently, but it is high ozone levels that have caused air quality to drop to yellow “moderate” levels in the East Bay on Saturday.