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LOS ANGELES—A wildfire in the San Fernando Valley that destroyed 15 homes has been surrounded.
State and local fire official announced Saturday that the 14,700-acre blaze near Porter Ranch was 100 percent contained, nearly a week after it began. They could not say exactly when the fire would be out.
Closed roads have been reopened and evacuation orders for some neighborhoods have been lifted.
The fire erupted Monday when high winds knocked down an electrical distribution line that fell into dry brush. It cost $12.6 million to fight, destroyed 15 homes and 63 outbuildings and damaged 11 homes.
The blaze was one of two this week only a few miles apart in the San Fernando Valley. A 4,800-acre blaze that destroyed about 40 homes and killed one person was contained Thursday. |
(Los Angeles, CA) Lassie the cat survived the Marek wildfire. Juan Fernandez reports.
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By Jacob Adelman
ASSOCIATED PRESS
9:04 p.m. October 15, 2008
LOS ANGELES – Wildfire activity eased significantly across Southern California on Wednesday as the notorious Santa Ana winds faded, allowing all remaining evacuation orders to be lifted.
Authorities found that the biggest of the region's fires was caused by a downed electrical line, and some people who lived in the 54 residences that burned this week returned only to find rubble.
“I've been crying for days,” said Tanya Valdivia, 32, as she searched the remains of her mobile home. “I guess it's just a natural thing but when you've lost everything, you're going to be upset.”
Her home was lost in one of two big fires that erupted along northern San Fernando Valley neighborhoods bordering brush and forest lands as the Santa Anas whipped through the region's canyons and passes.
Valdivia and her husband got out early Sunday, taking their wedding photos and two dogs, Chico and Oreo.
“It was a raging inferno,” she said, scanning blackened heaps of twisted metal.
One of the few items she could find was a headless ceramic bride figure from the top of her wedding cake.
“This was all I ever had,” she said. “This was my first home, and God knows when I'll be able to afford another one.”
Despite the decline of the Santa Anas, the National Weather Service extended warnings of risky conditions through Friday because of low humidity, which makes vegetation easier to burn.
Combined, three major fires in Southern California had scorched more than 34 square miles by Wednesday.
Fire officials said a 13,285-acre blaze at the northwest end of the valley was 50 percent contained. The fire, which began above the community of Porter Ranch on Monday, destroyed 15 homes and 47 outbuildings. Another six homes were damaged.
“The winds seem like they're going to cooperate,” said Michael Pittman, Los Angeles County Fire supervising dispatcher. He said there's no estimate on when the fire will be contained.
Investigators determined it was ignited when an electrical distribution line fell onto dry brush, the Los Angeles County Fire Department said in a statement. The incident occurred in a small drainage in an unincorporated area just above Porter Ranch. An investigation by county and state fire agencies and the Sheriff's Department was continuing.
Incident commander Scott Poster said places remained where no fire lines had been established “so if the wind hits it, it could move.”
Fire officials said there were about 3,000 homes in the vicinity and though some areas of the fire appeared to be extinguished, firefighters were digging into debris to make sure nothing was still burning under the surface.
With no smoke to obscure visibility, the fire's hopscotch path through the hills above the valley could be easily seen – blackened swaths and patches here and there where the winds hurled embers. Some houses stood unscathed next to the charred remnants of others.
Deborah Schwartz held back tears as firefighters walked her six horses down Browns Canyon Road near Porter Ranch and loaded them into trailers. Firefighters rescued them from a burning stable on Monday, but a friend's horse did not survive, she said.
“When I close my eyes that's all I see – not being able to help him,” she said.
“I lost everything I had, every saddle,” she said. “My horses are like homeless people.”
At the east end of the valley, a 4,824-acre fire was 90 percent contained. That blaze, which erupted into a wind-driven inferno early Sunday, destroyed 38 mobile homes and a house on the edge of Angeles National Forest.
A 4,026-acre fire at the Marine Corps' Camp Pendleton in San Diego County was 80 percent surrounded.
A fire that broke out on the fringe of the Cleveland National Forest on the border of Orange and Riverside counties Wednesday afternoon grew to nearly 20 acres by nightfall.
In Ventura County, northwest of Los Angeles, a 37-acre blaze just above Pacific Coast Highway in Point Mugu State Park was 70 percent contained.
Associated Press writers Shaya Tayefe Mohajer, Robert Jablon and Solvej Schou contributed to this report. |
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