Calif. Wildfire Forces Evacuations

I don't know if any of you have ever visited this area, but this is a place where we spend our time and now another place we love is being burned. It's really quite painful having all these fires off in the distance from our house. I found the Willow Fire quite painful too because of my love for that area. It seems like my "backyard" is on fire.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&ncid=533&e=1&cid=533&u=/ap/20020723/ap_on_re_us/wildfires_80

Calif. Wildfire Forces Evacuations
Tue Jul 23,10:49 AM ET

By KIM BACA, Associated Press Writer

JOHNSONDALE, Calif. (AP) - A fire driven by heavy winds grew to more than
9,100 acres, forcing more than 1,000 people to flee and threatening towering
trees at Sequoia National Park.

Several hundred Boy Scouts and campers evacuated, as did residents of this hamlet 130 miles north of Los Angeles and the nearby town of Ponderosa.

"I was scared. I've never seen it so close, it was coming so fast," said Simone Wallace, who left her home in Johnsondale and was staying in a motel with her boyfriend and 8-month-old daughter.

Authorities did not say Monday when evacuees would be allowed to return. The fire has burned 10 structures.

"It's got good potential behind it to grow to be a massive wildfire," said Denise Alonzo, a Sequoia National Forest spokeswoman.

The blaze did not appear to threaten the General Sherman tree, which at 275-feet tall and 30-feet across at its base is the nation's largest tree and the world's largest living thing based on volume, according to American Forest, which has monitored champion trees since 1940.

But the fire was burning near the 3,760-acre Giant Sequoia National Monument, which preserves about half of the 70 remaining groves of giant sequoias.

The fire began Sunday afternoon and crackled through a region that hasn't had rain since spring. Firefighters worried about lightning from thunderstorms forecast for later in the week.

The fire's cause was being investigated.

Elsewhere across the West, a fire that threatened 65 homes in southern Oregon grew to 94,000 acres and National Guard troops were sent to help. Gov. John Kitzhaber conducted an aerial tour of Oregon's wildfires and called the battle "a war."

"What is at risk here is hundreds of billions of dollars in natural resources," said Kitzhaber, who called on Congress to devote more resources to making forests healthy throughout the West.

Near Medford, Ore., a helicopter carrying two people crashed during a reconnaissance flight over a wildfire.

Both of those aboard were conscious when rescue crews arrived, said Mike Bartotti, a spokesman for the Oregon Department of Forestry fire team. He said state-contracted firefighting helicopters in two counties were temporarily grounded. The cause of the crash was under investigation.

In Colorado, higher humidity and a sprinkling of rain helped firefighters battling a 4,100-acre blaze near Rocky Mountain National Park. The fire was nearing a subdivision of several hundred homes, and crews sprayed foam and cleared brush in an effort to stop the flames.

About 225 homes in several subdivisions near Lyons, Colo., were evacuated and people in 400 to 500 more houses were told to be ready to flee.

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On the Net:

National Interagency Fire Center: http://www.nifc.gov