Calif. firefighters overtaken by fire

Three firefighters are hospitalized after 14 suffer burns and smoke inhalation battling wildfires.

SHAVER LAKE, Calif. — More than a dozen California firefighters trying to protect a mountain fire station from flames were overrun by the blaze Tuesday, and several were hurt. Elsewhere, military helicopters rescued more than 150 people stranded in the burning wilderness.

Fourteen firefighters and bulldozer operators deployed emergency shelters as flames overtook them and destroyed the Nacimiento Station in the Los Padres National Forest on the state’s central coast, the U.S. Forest Service said. They suffered from burns and smoke inhalation, and three were flown to a hospital in Fresno, where one was in critical condition.

The injuries came as wind-driven flames of more than two dozen major fires chewed through bone-dry California after a scorching Labor Day weekend that saw a dramatic airlift of more than 200.

Rescue choppers pulled another 164 people from the Sierra National Forest through the morning and were working to rescue 17 others, said Gov. Gavin Newsom, who described pilots wearing night-vision goggles to find a place to land.

California has already set a record with nearly 2.3 million acres burned this year, and the worst part of the wildfire season is just beginning.

“This is historic,” Newsom said in a briefing from Sacramento.

The previous acreage record was set just two years ago and included the deadliest wildfire in state history, which swept through the community of Paradise and killed 85 people. That 2018 blaze was started by power lines amid strong winds and tinder-dry conditions. Liability from billions of dollars in claims from that and other fires forced the state’s largest utility, Pacific Gas & Electric, to seek bankruptcy protection. To guard against new disasters, the company last year began preemptive power shutoffs when fire conditions are exceptionally dangerous.