By Nikki Cobb, Gina Tenorio and Jeff Horwitz
Inland Valley Daily Bulletin (California)
Copyright 2006 MediaNews Group, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
It was almost like commandeering Air Force One for forest fire duty.
For the first time, state firefighting officials enlisted the aid of a DC-10 jet that had been converted to an air tanker to fight the estimated 82,000-acre wildfires wreaking havoc in San Bernardino County’s mountains and desert.
At a cost of $52,000 a day to rent the giant aircraft, officials have to weigh the price of the aircraft against potential loss.
The fires have already claimed one life, and a number of firefighters have collapsed and been hospitalized for heat exhaustion.
The DC-10 can hold 12,000 gallons of flame retardant, about 10 times what the average California Department of Forestry and Fire tanker can hold and about as much as a typical backyard swimming pool.
Despite its cost, the jet is unmatched in its firefighting capacity and has local officials considering using it again.
“We tried it out today. We were very pleased with the results,” said CDF spokesman Jesse Estrada.
Fighting the fires has been complicated by thunderstorms and potential rain. The Sawtooth and Millard fires were ignited by lightning strikes, and more rolled into the San Bernardino mountain and desert areas Sunday.
The cost of fighting the conflagrations had risen to more than $14 million, and hundreds of structures and vehicles had been destroyed.
CDF, U.S. Forestry and San Bernardino County firefighters battled the flames. The two largest fires had merged into one.
Two smaller fires also confronted firefighters. About 3:30 p.m., lightning sparked a 10-acre blaze about a mile north of Green Valley Lake. Firefighters had it surrounded. It was dubbed the Crab Fire. And an 800-acre Heart Fire broke off from the Sawtooth and had defied containment.
There was concern that rain could cause rivers of mud and rockslides in the denuded hills, stripped of vegetation by the fires.
“The deep moisture has not arrived yet,” said Robert Balfour, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service. “The biggest threat to firefighting is lightning and high winds.”
He added a terrifying thought about the people out in the open, fighting the blazes on the bare hillsides:
“Firefighters are going to be lightning rods.”
The National Weather Service predicts a 20 percent chance of showers and/or thunderstorms for today in the area of the fires.
Humidity will be low — about 20 percent. Winds will be from the northwest at about 15 miles per hour, and temperatures are expected to reach a scorching 110 degrees.
And there’s no end in sight. According to Noel Isla of the weather service, temperatures will continue to push 110 degrees throughout the week.
Tuesday will bring the biggest threat of rain, Isla said. Thunderstorms could drop as much as two inches on the scorched hillsides, washing away the dirt where the vegetation has been charred.
“It’s the intensity, not so much the amount of rainfall,” Balfour said. “One quarter inch in 15 minutes will cause a debris flow.”
Jim Wilkins of the U.S. Forest Service said thunderstorms would not only spark fires and deluge vulnerable burn areas, but could hamper firefighting efforts in other ways.
The winds are changing, Wilkins said. They’re swinging around to the south — and a storm would only exacerbate their unpredictability.
“Storms bring chaotic winds. We don’t like chaotic winds,” Wilkins said.
The Millard Complex Fire, which began north of Cabazon, has charred 20,214 acres, and is 20 percent contained.
The Sawtooth Complex Fire, having burned 62,000 acres west of Yucca Valley, is 70 percent contained. Its movement toward the resort mountain town of Big Bear Lake appeared to have slowed, and fire officials said the town is in no danger.
The two fires merged Friday near the Mission Creek drainage area.
The Heart Zone fire — the western side of the Sawtooth fire — is burning national forest land. About 2,900 firefighters are battling that blaze, but conditions are poor.
“It’s extremely steep, rocky and with sparse vegetation,” said Karen Guillemin of the California Department of Forestry.
The body of Gerald Guthrie, 57, was found a mile northeast of his Pioneertown home, burned by the Sawtooth fire. Guthrie’s home did not burn and speculation was that he went into the field to check the progress of the flames and was overcome.
The Sawtooth threatened about 1,500 structures. The Millard fire continued to threaten 75 structures
A voluntary evacuation is in effect in the San Bernardino National Forest, on the eastern side of Mt. Onyx. It’s nine air miles from Highway 38, officials said.
Sunday afternoon, more than 2900 firefighters were battling the Sawtooth blaze, along with 10 helitankers, three helicopters, 284 engines, 35 bulldozers and 31 water tenders.
The Millard fire was being battled by 5,572 firefighters, five bulldozers, 23 helicopters, eight water tenders, and 31 engines.
In Redlands, one building was destroyed in a 575-acre fire titled the Edgemont Fire, that started Friday night and was 100 percent contained by this morning.
Still smoldering brush ignited other materials within the perimeter of the fire Sunday sending a giant column of smoke above the already burned area.
Balfour said he holds out little hope for what firefighters need, weatherwise. Instead, he worries about the impending thunderstorms.
“We’d like to see a nice steady rain, but that’s not what’s going to happen,” he said.