California wildfires drive 250,000 from homes
Officials: Firefighters ‘facing conditions they have never seen’
MALIBU, Calif. – Firefighters hoped that a brief lull in high winds would give them a chance Saturday to block, or at least slow, one of two massive California wildfires that have left at least 11 people dead and driven a quarter-million people from their homes.
Cal Fire officials said the Woolsey fire that destroyed at least 150 homes and forced residents to evacuate the entire seaside town of Malibu was still listed as “zero contained.”
Two more people were found dead in Malibu, near a scenic view along Mulholland Highway, according to Los Angeles County Sheriff ’s Department Chief John Benedict.
The Camp fire, which wiped out the town of Paradise in Butte County, 80 miles north of Sacramento, has consumed 156 square miles and was only 20 percent contained.
The brief respite in the high winds Saturday could give firefighters a chance to control the edges of the blazes and to swap crews, replacing firefighters who had worked for two days without rest, said Los Angeles County Fire Chief Daryl Osby.
But with the winds expected to return to 35 mph gusts Sunday, it’s likely more homes will be lost, Osby warned. Ventura Fire Depart Chief Mark Lorenzen said the devastating Santa Ana winds could last through Tuesday.
Osby said his firefighters were reporting “conditions they have never seen in their lives.”
“We did lose a lot of homes,” he said. “But we saved thousands of homes.”
He said firefighters’ objectives Saturday included perimeter control along the 101 freeway, and in Bell Canyon and Malibu Canyon.
At Pepperdine University in Malibu, classes were canceled Saturday after a tense Friday evening. When the allclear order was given around 9 a.m., A firefighter walks by a burning home in Malibu on Friday night. California fire officials said the Woolsey fire has destroyed at least 150 homes and forced residents to evacuate the entire seaside city of Malibu. many students drove away from the area, many equipped with face masks.
Despite the evacuation order for Malibu, Hassen Masri, who lives in the Malibu Country Estates neighborhood that abuts the university, stayed in his house Friday night and watched the hills rage with fire around him.
Around midnight, he saw nearly 20 trucks pull onto the Pepperdine University campus once officials learned the students wouldn’t be evacuating.
“It was a hairy experience; it was bad, it was really bad,” Masri said. “When the fire came over the ridge around midnight, I thought I should leave, but I didn’t. Maybe it was crazy that the university didn’t remove the students, but I am thankful for the extra resources that brought. I felt protected by those extra trucks.”
In Paris, President Donald Trump issued an emergency declaration providing federal funds for Butte, Ventura and Los Angeles counties but later threatened on Twitter to withhold federal payments to California, claiming its forest management is “so poor.”
“Billions of dollars are given each year, with so many lives lost, all because of gross mismanagement of the forests,” he wrote. “Remedy now, or no more Fed payments!”
Hardest hit was Paradise, a town of 27,000 in the Sierra Nevada foothills, where nine people died, some torched inside their cars as they were attempting to flee the sudden approach of the flames.