With lull in winds, crews step up fight
143,000-acre Thomas Fire taking aim at Santa Barbara
LA CONCHITA, Ventura County — Hoping to take advantage of a lull in the wind, an army of firefighters in Southern California embarked on a major offensive Friday against seven fires that have carved paths of destruction between Santa Barbara and San Diego.
Fierce Santa Ana winds have been whipping flames through wildlands, densely populated neighborhoods and rural communities all week and provoked two more fires in San Diego County over the past two days, but fire crews were waiting for their chance to pounce and took it Friday.
“We’re taking advantage of the lull in the wind and we are going with a direct assault,” said Fire Chief Jack Piccinini of the Rincon Valley and Windsor Fire Protection District, and an incident commander on the Thomas Fire, which has burned 143,000 acres in Ventura County and was heading toward Santa Barbara Friday afternoon.
The Thomas Fire, which started Sunday night, is the largest of the fires that have scorched Ventura, Los Angeles and San Diego counties. It was 10 percent contained Friday as firefighters set about building firebreaks to pinch off the flames.
Dozens of airplanes and helicopters dropped retardant, and bulldozers dug trenches where firefighters planned to make a stand far in advance of the leading edge of the ferocious blaze, which was about 15 miles southeast of the beachside community of Santa Barbara around sunset. The fire has also encroached into Los Padres National Forest from the east, west and north.
Mandatory evacuations were in place in parts of Santa Barbara County, prompting President Trump to declare a federal state of emergency for the West Coast for the second time since almost two dozen fires raged through the Wine Country and other parts of Northern California in October, killing 44 people and destroying
“This fire is going to spread in every direction of the compass depending on the terrain and the microclimate where the flames happen to be. ” Mark Brown, Thomas Fire operations chief and deputy chief of the Marin County Fire Department
thousands of homes.
“Our priority is the portion of the fire heading toward Santa Barbara,” said Mark Brown, the fire operations chief who is also deputy chief of the Marin County Fire Department. “That portion of the fire significantly slowed.”
Brown, who, along with Piccinini, has been fighting major fires since July, said the Santa Ana winds were at least predictable, blowing from east to west, but without them fire behavior can be erratic.
“This fire is going to spread in every direction of the compass depending on the terrain and the microclimate where the flames happen to be,” he said. “We have to be ready for everything.”
More than 400 structures, including at least 73 homes and three commercial buildings, have been destroyed in the fire, which, combined with all the other conflagrations, have sent clouds of smoke wafting throughout California, including the Bay Area.
The wind-blown fires have put exhausted crews on edge because every time they get a handle on one fire, another one blows up.
That’s what happened with the Lilac Fire in San Diego County, which forced hundreds of firefighters to scramble southward when it started around 11:15 a.m. Thursday. It grew to 4,100 acres overnight and leveled at least 85 structures — including a mobile home retirement community and at least 20 other homes. Three people were burned escaping from flames, said Capt. Nick Schuler of California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, also known as Cal Fire.
The Lilac, which was 15 percent contained Friday evening, swept through the sprawling San Luis Rey Downs training facility for thoroughbreds in the town of Bonsall, killing as many as 25 horses that were trapped in their stalls. Many of the more than 450 horses at the facility were cut loose so they could escape on their own from the stables, said Mac McBride of the Del Mar Thoroughbred Club.
Horse trainer Scott Hansen said some of his 30 horses at the facility were killed. The California Horse Racing Board said most of the horses died in eight barns that burned. Many others in adjacent pastures were unaccounted for, he said.
Gov. Jerry Brown declared a state of emergency in the county.
“I have determined that this incident is of such severity and magnitude that continued effective response is beyond the capabilities of state and local governments,” Brown wrote in a letter to Trump.
Yet another fire erupted on Friday near the mountain town of Alpine, about 30 miles east of downtown San Diego. More than 1,000 firefighters, aided by seven air tankers and 15 helicopters, have mobilized to fight the fires in San Diego County.
In all, 10,000 people in the path of the San Diego County blazes have been evacuated, 900 of whom are now in shelters in that region, officials said.
The devastation across Southern California has been enormous, as nearly 200,000 people have been forced to evacuate, homes and neighborhoods have burned, and at least three people have been injured. A woman was found dead in her car near Ojai in Ventura County and her death has been attributed to the Thomas Fire.
The cost to the federal government, combined with the $7.4 billion it will take to rebuild after the deadly fires in Sonoma, Napa, Mendocino and Yuba counties, is expected to be enormous, and fire officials say their problems are far from over.
“The Thomas Fire was the first fire and the weather conditions haven’t changed significantly since that first day — and new fires keep happening,” said Todd Derum, incident commander for the Thomas Fire, who is also the Cal Fire operations chief for Sonoma County. “That puts a strain on firefighters, physically and mentally. This portion of Southern California has not received significant rainfall, so the wildland fuels are just as dry as they were in late summer or fall.”
The Santa Ana winds, which fanned the fires earlier this week, were expected to kick up again through the weekend, with gusts of up to 30 miles per hour, said Drew Peterson, a meteorologist for the National Weather Service.
On Friday, after the worst of the winds had passed, soupy smog clouded the coast from Ventura to Santa Barbara. It was so thick that the ocean couldn’t be seen from the iconic Pacific Coast Highway. Even the most committed of surfers stayed home. The state beaches were empty and the storefronts were closed.
Though evacuation orders in many areas had been lifted and roads reopened, some residents decided not to return home because of the poor air quality. Electricity was out in some areas of the fire zones and officials said it could take days to weeks to restore it.
Peter Dugré, 35, briefly returned to his home in La Conchita, which looked like it would be consumed by the Thomas Fire until fire crews dug in and the wind shifted. Embers and ash dusted the front porch, and plastic sand buckets and clothes hangers were blown askew. He hummed Elton John’s “I’m Still Standing.”
“It’s a goddamn miracle this place is still here,” Dugré said of the tiny hamlet Friday as he hosed down his patio before heading to Carpinteria, where a long-delayed meal was waiting. “I was already resigned to the fact that this place was burning down. I had no idea I would be so emotional until I saw my house still here.”
Smoke from the fires drifted all the way to the Bay Area, prompting officials to declare a Spare the Air alert over the weekend. It is so bad in Southern California that the chunks of ash are pirouetting around in the wind like snowflakes, dusting every car window and sticking in people’s hair.
As the air quality worsened Friday, face masks sold out at stores across Santa Barbara and Ventura counties.
“My friend had to grab them for me,” said Stephen Clark, 21, who drove to Santa Barbara from Goleta to get another mask for his sister. “I have asthma and can feel myself having trouble breathing. I have a headache and feel drowsy. I can’t believe the smoke is so bad.”
Bay Area firefighters from
“I resigned was already to the fact that this place was burning down. I had no idea I would be so emotional until I saw my house still here.” Peter Dugré, La Conchita resident
more than a dozen departments are helping combat the fires in a kind of quid pro quo after Southern California personnel helped fight the Wine Country fires.
They seem to have gotten a handle on a fire that broke out Thursday in Riverside County, near the cities of Murrieta and Temecula. The Liberty Fire, which burned 300 acres, was 60 percent contained Friday.
Three other fires are being beaten back, including the 15,619-acre Creek Fire, which destroyed five homes and 10 structures in the Sylmar and Lake View Terrace areas of Los Angeles. It was 70 percent contained.
The 6,049-acre Rye Fire in Santa Clarita, Los Angeles County, which started Tuesday, is 50 percent contained and the 475-acre Skirball Fire, which broke out Wednesday morning in the Bel-Air hills neighborhood of Los Angeles, was 50 percent contained. The Getty Center, which had been threatened by the fire, announced it would reopen Friday. Classes at nearby UCLA also resumed.