The Associated Press
LOS OLIVOS, Calif. — Fire crews braced Saturday for another possible flare-up by a month-old forest fire that has forced hundreds of people to flee rural cabins.
“It’s not good. We expect it to run again,” fire spokesman Pete Nicklin said Saturday.
The fire in Los Padres National Forest had charred an estimated 44,400 acres, 70 square miles, by Saturday and was 60 percent contained, little changed from Friday, fire officials said.
Flames were about four miles from the Santa Barbara County hamlet of Paradise Road, where firefighters guarded some of the 175 threatened homes. About 650 people evacuated the community Friday, along with youngsters from a camp for delinquent boys.
The wildfire had been slowed for days by a weather condition that trapped cool, moist air at ground level, but the weather changed Friday and the blaze dashed through 6,000 acres of wilderness.
On Saturday, northeasterly wind was threatening to blow up and fan the flames into head-high brush.
“It hasn’t burned in 100 years. It’s thick and heavy, and it’s tinder-dry,” Nicklin said.
The area was crowded with thousands of visitors for Santa Barbara’s annual Old Spanish Days Fiesta.
The blaze was started July 4 by sparks from equipment being used to repair a water pipe.
Elsewhere, about 50 houses threatened by a wind-whipped fire were ordered evacuated in southwestern Montana’s Granite County, said Karen Semple, a fire information officer. The fire had covered 2,400 acres, she said.
Other residents north of Helena who fled a 49-square-mile fire Thursday night had been allowed to return to their homes, but the Lewis and Clark County sheriff’s office told them to be prepared to leave again.
Crews had contained 33 percent of that fire, in the Gates of the Mountains Wilderness, since July 21. Fire managers hoped progress achieved during the week would not be reversed as forecasts called for 35 mph gusts, said Cheryl Larsen, a fire information officer.
A handful of homes and cabins in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula were evacuated Saturday as a precaution near a wildfire that had blackened about 5,300 acres, said Department of Natural Resources spokeswoman Mary Dettloff.
The fire was 30 percent contained Saturday, but fire officials were concerned about the possible of stiffening wind, Dettloff said. The DNR said the fire was probably started by lightning on Thursday.
Elsewhere, flames had blackened about four square miles of remote pine forest in southern New Jersey, authorities said. The fire, which started Friday, wasn’t contained Saturday but wasn’t showing signs of spreading, said Elaine Makatura, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Environmental Protection.