Within minutes of attacking blaze, fire crew was surrounded
The Freeway Complex fire moved so fast that a truck heading to protect homes soon after the blaze started had to be diverted to save colleagues in peril.
When firefighters square off against a blaze, there can come a moment when the enemy gains control, when the combination of wind and flame and tinder overmatches the hoses.
For the Corona Fire Department, that moment came at 9:23 a.m. Saturday, 22 minutes after the first 911 call reported a small brush fire in the vegetation off the 91 Freeway.
It was a distress call from Engine 5, the first truck to attack the blaze. Using a tactical frequency, the captain of the four-person crew -- three men and a woman -- cried out to battalion chief Mike Samuels, stationed on the freeway above:
"We're completely surrounded. Send help."
From his position, Samuels could see the flames tearing through the brush toward homes, pushed by 20 mph gusts of Santa Ana winds, the fire intensifying as it struck what he called "heavy fuels" -- 8-foot-tall patches of oak and chaparral.
"I've been in the fire service 21 years, and I've never seen a fire move out that fast," Samuels would say later.
Other trucks were attacking the fire and one of them, Brush One, was heading to protect homes. Samuels decided to divert it to rescue the crew of Engine 5.
As Brush One fought its way through black smoke and heat toward the encircled firefighters, Engine 5 stayed on the radio, awaiting help and using its training to survive. A common tactic in such a situation is for firefighters to "get in the black" -- position themselves and their truck in an area that has already burned. To help, Samuels called in helicopter water drops.
The extrication of Engine 5 took 15 to 20 minutes, by Samuels' estimate, and soon the four crew members were heading to hospitals for treatment of minor burns and smoke inhalation. They were all released that day. It was, in firefighter parlance, a "near miss" -- a narrow escape from death or serious harm.
The distress call signaled a "pivotal moment" in a fire that would soon spread to Yorba Linda, Anaheim Hills, Brea and Diamond Bar, destroying hundreds of homes, said David Waltemeyer, chief of the Corona Fire Department.
"We realized this was going to be a major incident that's probably going to last us several days," he said.
Motorists spot blaze
On that bright and clear Saturday, the first in a flurry of 911 calls came into the Corona Fire Department's dispatch center at 9:01 a.m.
