All Kincade Fire evacuation orders are lifted
GEYSERVILLE >> Firefighters continue gaining ground on the Kincade Fire in Sonoma County that ripped through homes and businesses last week, bringing containment up to 84% as of Tuesday morning and prompting all evacuation orders to be lifted.
The fire, which sparked the night of Oct. 23 and explosively grew amid high winds in the mountains east of Geyserville, did not grow over the weekend or Monday overnight, according to Cal Fire.
The blaze has consumed just under 78,000 acres, or about 122 square miles, and destroyed 374 structures, of which 174 were homes and 11 were businesses.
Cal Fire expects to fully contain the blaze by Thursday.
As of Tuesday morning, all evacuation orders — which at one point covered virtually half of Sonoma County — had been lifted. The Sonoma County Public Health Order remains in place.
The number of firefighters on the ground has shrunk to about 2,100 from more than 4,000 at the blaze’s peak.
Authorities have been giving residents extensive warnings to wear protective gear and be aware of potentially hazardous chemicals as they return to areas burned
by the fire, but all restrictions have been lifted for those returning to their homes.
Over the past few days, the Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office required people to check in with county workers before entering the areas under evacuation warnings. Those checkpoints have been removed.
Cal Fire said the blaze still threatens more than 400 structures.
Many people feared the Kincade Fire would be far more destructive than it has been, and it revived memories of the fires that have killed dozens of people in each of the past two years.
No one has been killed in the Kincade Fire.
Mandatory evacuation orders forced thousands out of their homes as firefighters worried that hurricane-force winds could sweep the blaze through cities along Highway 101 and perhaps beyond it.
But firefighters dug in, holding off the flames at the edges of Windsor until the third in a series of dangerous windstorms subsided Oct. 30.
That proved to be the turning point in the fight against the blaze.
The winds since then have been calm, allowing fire crews to gain the upper hand, and National Weather Service forecasts didn’t show any windstorms over the next week.
Still, there is no rain in Northern California’s forecast either, keeping fire danger high.