OJAI — The flames that blackened about 3,500 acres in little more than a day may also keep hundreds of firefighters out on the line over Christmas.
The wild card is the wind; with weather forecasts calling for more Santa Anas this morning, about 1,100 firefighters could be spending their holiday hacking out firebreaks, slogging through hot ash on steep hillsides and hoping for an end to gusts so strong they moved the fire a mile in just 15 minutes.
For residents in the lightly populated region just outside Ojai, it could be an anxious Christmas. By Wednesday evening, only one home had been destroyed but many more will be in harm's way if winds turn and lash the flames closer to town, fire officials said.
Preparing for the possibility of further damage, Ventura County Sheriff Bob Brooks on Wednesday designated the county a local disaster area--a step required for fire victims to receive state aid.
Wednesday night, winds had died down and temperatures were dropping into the low 40s. By 10 p.m., some firefighters were drinking hot soup and preparing to bundle up in sleeping bags. They hoped to get a few hours rest before winds picked up and forced them back to the fire lines.
Some firefighters had been working nonstop since shortly after the blaze broke out in a brushy area of Upper Ojai just before 8 p.m. Tuesday.
Kevin Wallace, a strike team leader from the Montecito Fire Department, took a lunch break Wednesday at the Soule Park command post. It was his first break since arriving the previous night.
"The embers were blowing like hail--red-hot hail," he said. "You'd get some in the nose, some in the eyes--it was extremely tough."
Wallace had seen towering flames and felt the hot blast of the Santa Anas. He started talking about the prospect of Christmas with his family, but changed direction as swiftly as the wind: "I'm deceiving myself."
Firefighters from all over California converged on the blaze--engines from San Diego to San Luis Obispo. Some had come straight from a smaller blaze near the Rincon that started about 1 a.m. Wednesday. That fire burned 250 acres, including an avocado orchard. The blaze was 95% contained at 5 p.m. Wednesday.
Even so, it was frightening for Rincon residents awakened by the smell of smoke in the middle of the night.
"The vision I saw when I woke up was apocalyptic," Tony DiIoia said. "Flames were taking up whole hillsides, embers were flying and smoke was coming toward me."
