Fast-moving brush fire in California burns 2 homes, others damaged by smoke and water

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — A fast-moving fire fed by strong winds burned two homes Friday and damaged several others in a hillside neighborhood in the city of Oakland, where roughly 500 people were ordered to evacuate, officials said.

Fire Chief Damon Covington said that at about 1:30 p.m., calls came in reporting a fire in front of a home in the Oakland hills. Crews arrived as the inferno quickly grew with winds ranging from calm breezes to 40 mph (64 kph) gusts during red flag conditions.

“Wind was whipping,” Covington said.

Michael Hunt, a spokesperson for the fire department, said one of the homes was significantly burned while the second suffered minor damage from the flames. Fewer than 10 other homes had smoke and water damage. Early reports had conflicting numbers of impacted structures.

The fire was near the 580 Freeway, which connects the San Francisco Bay Area to central California, causing traffic jams as people tried to leave the area and smoke wafted over the city of 440,000.

The blaze charred through eucalyptus trees, which spread the fire as flames jumped across sides of the roadway, Covington said. Within three hours, it grew to to 13 acres (about 5.3 hectares). By about 4 p.m. crews were able to stop it from advancing, though scores of firefighters continued to battle.

“We have less than 10 homes that have been damaged, and we had hundreds of homes, structures, that were threatened,” the chief said.

The cause of the fire was not immediately known.

Authorities issued red flag warnings for fire danger until Saturday across a large swath of the state, from the central coast through the Bay Area and into northern Shasta County, not far from the Oregon border.

A California utility shut off power in 19 counties in the northern and central part of the state as a major “ diablo wind ” — notorious in autumn for its hot, dry gusts — spiked the risk of wildfire.

The blaze in the Oakland Hills burned a day before the Oct. 19 anniversary of a 1991 fire that destroyed nearly 3,000 homes and killed 25 people.

Smoke was visible Friday 2 to 3 miles (3 to 5 kilometers) away. Firetrucks and ambulances struggled to get through the gridlock in the freeway’s westbound lanes, their sirens blasting to get vehicles to move out of their way as they raced toward the blaze. The traffic frustrated some drivers enough that they exited the roadway through on-ramps, while others drove on the freeway’s shoulder. The side streets remained heavily gridlocked as well.

Red flag warnings were also issued in parts of Southern California where another brush fire was burning toward homes in the Rolling Heights area of Los Angeles County, the Los Angeles County Fire Department said.

The fire was reported around 3:00 p.m. in the Hacienda Heights hills where firefighters on the ground and in the air were trying to stop the 5-acre (2-hectare) blaze from reaching nearby homes, the department said. No evacuations have been ordered.

About 16,000 customers were without electricity Friday after Pacific Gas and Electric shut off power.

During a diablo wind, the air is so dry that relative humidity levels plunge, drying out vegetation and making it ready to burn. The name — “diablo” is Spanish for “devil” — is informally applied to a hot wind that blows near the San Francisco region from the interior toward the coast as high pressure builds over the West.

The “diablo wind” is forecast to cause sustained winds reaching 35 mph (56 kph) in many areas, with possible gusts topping 65 mph (104 kph) along mountaintops, according to the National Weather Service. The strong winds are expected to last through part of the weekend.

A total of about 20,000 customers could lose power temporarily in the next couple of days, PG&E said in a statement Friday.

The National Weather Service issued red flag warnings for the valleys and mountains of Los Angeles County, portions of the Inland Empire, and the San Bernardino Mountains from Santa Anas, dry, warm and gusty northeast winds that blow from the interior of Southern California toward the coast and offshore The winds move in the opposite direction of the normal onshore flow that carries moist air from the Pacific into the region.

Winds around greater Los Angeles won’t be as powerful as up north, with gusts between 25 and 40 mph (40 and 64 kph) possible in mountains and foothills, said Mike Wofford, a meteorologist with the weather service’s Los Angeles-area office.

The strongest winds were being recorded in the Santa Monica and San Gabriel mountains, where Friday there were gusts between 45 and 55 mph (72 and 88 kph) with isolated gusts up to 60 mph (96 kph), he said.

Meanwhile, some mountaintops around Lake Tahoe received light snowfall overnight Friday, according to the National Weather Service in Reno, Nevada. Near sub-freezing temperatures are expected again Friday night into Saturday

Wind sensors in two peaks west of Lake Tahoe registered 75 and 104 mph (120 kph and 167 kph) winds Friday with strong winds expected to continue through the night before tapering off Saturday morning, the National Weather Service said.

The service also issued its first freeze warning of the season along the Sierra’s eastern front effective from 2 a.m. to 9 a.m. Friday from south of Carson City to the north through Reno into Lassen, Sierra and Plumas counties in California where temperatures could dip into the low 20s Fahrenheit (-5 Celsius).

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Dazio reported from Los Angeles.