Helicopters, air tankers battle to hold down fire
No one injured, but 47-acre foothill blaze exposes phone notification bug
A four-alarm grass fire in San Jose’s east foothills burned 47 acres and killed a pet dog that lived in one of two structures destroyed by the fast-moving blaze, authorities said.
The fire also exposed a glitch in the city’s emergency notification system that led to many residents receiving evacuation alerts on their phones throughout the day, long after initial evacuation alerts had been lifted.
San Jose Fire Capt. Mitch Matlow said no residents or firefighters were injured by the fire that broke out just after 11 a.m. near Aborn Road and Gurdwara Avenue in Evergreen, where major residential development ends and lightly traveled roads ascend into the hills.
About 1 p.m., the San Jose Fire Department and Cal Fire, backed by an array of helicopters and air tankers filled with fire retardant, announced that the Aborn fire was contained. An hour later, officials said the blaze was more than 60 percent contained, and firefighters were expected to spend the rest of the afternoon fully extinguishing it.
“We’re still working some hot spots,” Matlow said.
Officials confirmed that a mobile home and cottage were destroyed, the latter of which contained the fire’s only known casualty, a pet dog. According to KGO-TV, this news organization’s media partner, 2-year-old Bubbi was home alone when the fire broke out. Its owner told NBC Bay Area that the dog had been rescued from Hurricane Harvey.
At its peak, the blaze threatened several more homes off Aborn Road and Lazy Lane, which hosts a cluster of hillside homes that had been relatively remote until a suburban expansion that started in the 1990s nearly reached their doorsteps.
The work by the array of firefighters, pilots and heavy equipment operators who responded to the blaze meant that its dark, billowing smoke, which could be seen from downtown San Jose, had largely dissipated within two hours of the initial fire call.
Emergency cellphone alerts urged residents and others near Aborn Road and Lazy Lane to evacuate; Santa Clara County Cal Fire spokeswoman Pam Temmermand said there were no mandatory evacuation orders in place as of Monday afternoon.
And yet residents and others in the area continued to receive alerts throughout the day detailing the same initial evacuation order.
“They went out one time, between 12:20 and 12:25. One of the issues we’re trying to work out is why they’re still going out,” Ray Riordan, director of San Jose’s Office of Emergency Services, said late Monday afternoon.
Recipients typically are targeted using software that allows a user to “draw a polygon” around an affected area on a map of the city, and cell towers within the selected space are supposed to send alerts to phones within their range.
Riordan said the system sometimes can cast a wider net than planned because towers near the border of such an emergency zone can inadvertently receive alert signals. He said the system worked as intended in February when the city warned residents of potential flooding from the Guadalupe River.
“We’re not sure why it’s continuing, why they’re still broadcasting,” he said of Monday’s errant alerts.
Temmermand said residents and others displaced by the fire, or otherwise unable to return to their homes, had the option of heading to the Evergreen Community Center at San Felipe and Yerba Buena roads, near Evergreen Valley College.
With the fire in check, authorities were turning their attention to evacuating livestock in the area, Temmermand said. PG&E temporarily cut off power to the area to repair a power line that was arcing due to fire damage; service has been restored to most affected residents, Matlow said.