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California firefighters say major wildfire mostly contained California governor links wildfire increase to climate change
(about 4 hours later)
Firefighters battling a major wildfire in southern California surrounded most of the blaze overnight, a fire official said, as evacuated residents began to return to a region where dozens of homes have been destroyed by a series of fires. Drought-stricken California is preparing for its worst wildfire season ever, the state's governor said on Sunday.
Conditions on Saturday were less windy than earlier in the week, when hot, dry Santa Ana winds drove the flames on their destructive path. Governor Jerry Brown told ABC's This Week that the nearly dozen wildfires that this week caused more than $20m in damage mark only the beginning. The state has 5,000 firefighters and has appropriated $600m to battling blazes, but that may not be enough.
Some residents evacuated from the San Marcos area were allowed to return home late on Friday and additional evacuation orders had been lifted by Saturday evening, San Diego county officials said. "We're getting ready for the worst," Brown said. "Now, we don't want to anticipate before we know, but we need a full complement of firefighting capacity."
All road closures and evacuation orders were anticipated to be lifted at 6pm Pacific Time on Sunday, the county said. He added that thousands of additional firefighters may be needed in the future, saying California is on the "front lines" of climate change that is making its weather hotter.
It was not immediately clear how many residents were still unable to return home, but earlier in the week officials said 125,000 people lived in the evacuation zones for all the San Diego county wildfires combined. "And in the years to come, we're going to have to make very expensive investments and adjust. And the people are going to have to be careful of how they live, how they build their homes and what kind of vegetation is allowed to grow around them.”
In all, nearly a dozen fires scorched about 20,000 acres (8,093 hectares) of drought-parched brush across San Diego county this past week. As firefighters brought several of the blazes under control, a man was charged on Friday with one count of arson in connection with one of the smaller fires. Unusually high temperatures, low humidity and gusty winds set conditions last week for the string of wildfires that broke out in San Diego County.
With cool, moist air coming in from the Pacific coast, firefighters gained the upper hand overnight against the so-called Cocos Fire, one of the region's fiercest, that threatened the suburban community of San Marcos north of San Diego. By Saturday morning, firefighters had contained 70% of the 2,520-acre (1020-hectare), said fire task force spokesman Tim Evans. That marked a significant improvement from Friday, when the blaze was only 10% contained. "Normally, I don't even put wildfire gear in my vehicle until the end of April. This year I never took it out," Kirk Kushen, battalion chief of the Kern County Fire Department, said at a base camp in Escondido. "We never really completed the 2013 fire season. It's been a continuation."
The Cocos Fire destroyed a dozen houses and another 25 structures at a local spiritualism center, county officials said. At least 10 fires spanning 39 square miles chewed a destructive path through San Diego County, destroying 11 houses, an 18-unit apartment complex and two businesses. A badly burned body was found in a transient camp; one firefighter suffered heat exhaustion.
A charred body was found on Thursday at a homeless encampment overrun by flames in coastal Carlsbad, although officials said they had yet to confirm the exact cause of death. The last of tens of thousands of evacuees returned home on Saturday after firefighters scoured charred hillsides north of San Diego to guard against a resurgence of flames that ripped through the region.
The Carlsbad blaze, which scorched 600 acres (243 hectares), left property losses of up to $15m, gutted eight houses and destroyed an apartment building, officials said. The California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection has responded to more than 1,500 fires this year, compared to about 800 in an average year.
Alberto Serrato was charged on Friday with one count of arson in connection with a small fire this week in the coastal community of Oceanside, said a spokeswoman with the San Diego County District Attorney's office. Serrato faces a maximum of seven years in prison if convicted. The first blaze in San Diego started on Tuesday and was caused by a spark from construction equipment, according to state officials, but it could take months to get to the bottom of the most damaging fires. Alberto Serrato, 57, pleaded not guilty on Friday to an arson charge in connection with one of the smaller fires, but authorities say they don't believe he started it, just added brush to it.
In the Central California city of Modesto, a fire fueled by hot weather and high winds on Friday quickly spread to a row of town houses, destroying three of the structures and damaging six others. Authorities said the blaze started on the grassy berm of a freeway project frequented by homeless people.
Ocean breezes and lower temperatures over the weekend allowed firefighters to get the upper hand on a four-square-mile blaze that started in the suburb of San Marcos and three fires at Camp Pendleton.
Firefighters doused remaining hotspots with hoses and water-filled backpacks, sawed large logs and raked soil with shovels and other hand tools to ensure the ground was moist enough to prevent fires from returning.
Kushen, who was working a 10th straight day and was nearly 27 hours into his shift as his team prepared to go rest at a hotel, saw between 15 and 20 destroyed houses or other structures while combing the hills in and around San Marcos for smoke and smouldering brush.
San Marcos, a suburb of 85,000 people where strip malls and new housing tracts mix with older homes, slowly returned to normal as more roadblocks were removed.
"It's such a wonderful blessing to be back," Jamie Williams said as he unloaded three bags of clothing from his car that he took when ordered to evacuate Wednesday night. "It was almost a teary-eyed kind of thing."
The state firefighting agency went to peak staffing in the first week of April, instead of its usual start in mid-May.
Battalion Chief Kevin Taylor of the Paso Robles Fire Department in central California usually doesn't leave home until late July to assist other agencies during the fire season. He was dispatched to the Los Angeles area in January and led a crew that began work near San Diego on Thursday.
"There hasn't been a break," said Taylor, as he ate lunch under a tree, under orders to be ready to move on three minutes' notice. "It's almost a 12-month fire season."