Blue Cut Fire Scorches 5,500 Acres Near Cajon Pass
It was a recipe for flaming disaster.
Unrelenting heat, gusting winds and tinder-dry chaparral that would snap when touched provided bountiful ammunition for a fast-moving fire that incinerated30,000 acres of Southern California terrainand forcedmore than 80,000to evacuate.
The fire broke out lateTuesday morningin terrain so rugged and steep that its like wadded-up paper said Michael Wakoski, battalion chief of the San Bernardino County Fire Departmentand incident commander of the Blue Cut fire.
Its almost impossible to move up and down the slopes, he said. It makes containment of the fire very difficult.
The Cajon Pass, a natural wind tunnel, created a funnel that increased wind speeds by20 mph to 30 mph,pushing the blaze north and helping it jump the 15 Freeway, he said.The fire was spotting half a mile ahead of itself.
You add the wind, the fuel and the lay of the land and they all line up for a disaster, he said. The brush is like stick.They just break off when you walk through them.Its a disaster that has been waiting to happen all year, waiting for a spark.
Authorities are still investigating the cause of the fire that was first reportedTuesday around 10 a.m.
When firefighters arrived, a cargo train moving through the Cajon Pass stood idle on the tracks, Wakoski said.The engineer had abandoned it on the tracks.
Complicating containment was a patchwork of infrastructure that convenesin the Cajon Pass and services a large swath of Southern California, includingelectricalpower lines, high-pressure gas lines, pipelines forjet fuel and a network offiber-optic cables.
Firefighters fought hard toget ahead of the fire, but in the end, they could do little to contain it.
We got our butts kicked, Wakoskisaid.
The fire ripped through mountain pine trees, desert yucca, brush and chaparral.
Fires burn differently in different types of fuel, soyou will get a change in fire behavior very quickly. It can go from real slow burning to extreme burning in a heartbeat, he said.
Three firefighters were treated and released for smoke inhalation.
Wakoski said in his 40-year career fighting fires, he never has seen anything like this.
We are not even in the hot part of fire season yet, he said. This is October-like fire behavior conditions we"re having right now, and were only in August, so we are in for a fight.
Source: http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-updates-wildfire-season-california-2016-htmlstory.html
