Weather aids fight against LA wildfire

FIREFIGHTERS made more progress yesterday against a giant wildfire that has ravaged a national forest north of Los Angeles, with another day of co-operative weather a big help to beleaguered fire crews.

The blaze in the Angeles National Forest had burned 350 sq km by yesterday. Firefighters have created a perimeter around 22% of the blaze, largely by removing brush with bulldozers and setting controlled burns. Bulldozers still have 152km of fire line to build.

“The crews are making excellent progress based on the improved weather conditions,” said US Forest Service Incident Commander Mike Dietrich at a news conference yesterday.

State Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger visited the fire area yesterday morning and served breakfast to firefighters, giving them plenty of protein so “they get all pumped up for the next fight out there with those fires”.

Since erupting on August 26, the blaze has destroyed more than five dozen homes, killed two firefighters and forced thousands of residents from their homes. The cause is still not known.

Officials were also keeping a close eye on the wind, which had been calm overnight but could pick up and move flames closer to homes.

Commander Dietrich was not willing to say a corner had been turned.

Officials also worried about the threat to a historic observatory and TV, radio and other antennae on Mount Wilson northeast of Los Angeles. But on Tuesday, firefighters set backfires near the facilities before a giant World War II-era seaplane-turned-air tanker made a huge water drop on flames inching toward the peak from the north and west.

By nightfall, 150 firefighters and engines were at the peak to defend the towers, said fire spokesman Paul Lowenthal.

The flames crossed the Angeles Crest Highway into the San Gabriel Wilderness to the east. Firefighters made progress on fire breaks to the north near Acton and south-west from Altadena to the Sunland neighbourhood.

Firefighters and longtime residents know it could be so much worse. Autumn is when the ferocious Santa Ana winds can sweep in from the north-eastern deserts, gaining speed through canyons, sapping moisture from vegetation and pushing flames further out into the suburbs.