Fresh wildfires sweep through state, burn homes
LOS ANGELES» In heatstricken Southern California, powerful winds that sent an overnight inferno hopscotching through the Santa Barbara County community of Goleta vanished in the morning, allowing firefighters to extinguish smoldering ruins of an estimated 20 structures, including homes.
“It’s really given us a good opportunity to get in there and get some work done,” said county fire Capt. Dave Zaniboni.
The fire’s spread was stopped at about 100 acres, and teams were working on an accurate tally of damage in the neighborhood, where some houses were in ruins while homes next door were intact.
Eric Durtschi stood outside his destroyed house, where a burned-out car stood in the driveway and kids’ bicycles were strewn about.
Durtschi, his wife and six children had left Utah and moved in just a few weeks ago. He said he hadn’t yet told his two oldest children their home was gone. He managed to collect his severely burned vintage guns, hoping to salvage them.
A neighbor’s home across the street was spared. The man had stayed through the night spraying down other people’s houses.
Elsewhere in Southern California, firefighters increased containment of a central San Diego County fire that rapidly spread over 400 acres, destroyed 18 structures and damaged eight, and a wildfire in the San Bernardino National Forest was holding at 1.5 square miles and forced evacuation of about 700 homes in the mountain community of Forest Falls.
Fires also burned on the Marine Corps’ sprawling Camp Pendleton base in northern San Diego County.
The Southern California fires erupted Friday as strong high pressure over the West spawned an epic heat wave that saw parts of Los Angeles broil in temperatures up to 117 degrees. There was little relief overnight.
“Temperatures at 8 a.m. were ridiculously over 100 degrees” in foothills near Forest Falls and many inland valleys, the National Weather Service said.
Forecasters said the region’s siege of heat would gradually ease through the weekend, but the unstable air mass unleashed downpours that triggered flashflood warnings for the mountains northeast of Los Angeles.
Farther north — just south of the California-oregon state line — the 34square-mile Klamathon fire in rural Siskiyou County was just 5 percent contained. The body of a resident was found Friday in the ruins of a home, among 15 destroyed structures tallied so far.
Authorities described “extreme fire behavior with movement in multiple directions,” with threats to the California communities of Hornbrook and Hilt as well as Colestin, Ore. Ray Haupt, chairman of the county Board of Supervisors, said losses included homes and livestock.
Elsewhere in California, the 138-square-mile County fire northwest of Sacramento was nearly 50 percent contained. Ten structures were counted destroyed but damage assessments were continuing.