WINDS THREATEN TO STOKE CALDOR FIRE IN SIERRAS

Crews were digging in and burning out fire lines amid fears that another round of high winds on Saturday would bring renewed fury to a Northern California wildfire.

“We have a firefight ahead of us and the wind today is going to make it very challenging,” said Keith Wade, a spokesman with the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, or Cal Fire.

The Caldor fire in the northern Sierra Nevada already destroyed dozens of homes, and authorities on Friday closed down a 46-mile stretch of Interstate 50, the main route between Sacramento and Lake Tahoe on the Nevada state line.

The highway was closed after debris from the blaze fell onto the roadway and because of red f lag warnings for 20- to 30mph winds that could gust to 40 mph throughout Saturday.

The road is a key checkpoint as crews struggle against the fire, which erupted earlier this week and grew to 10 times its size in a few days, fueled by winds.

“We’re going to invest everything we can into holding the fire south” of the road, said Eric Schwab, an operations section chief with Cal Fire.

The Caldor fire had devoured about 130 square miles as of Saturday and more than 1,500 firefighters were battling it amid heavy timber and rugged terrain.

The blaze was one of about a dozen large California wildfires that have scorched Northern California, incinerating at least 700 homes alone in and around the Sierra Nevada communities of Greenville and Grizzly Flats.

The fires, mainly in the northern part of the state, have burned nearly 1.5 million acres, and have sent smoke as far as the East Coast.