San Gabriel Canyon

Firefighters on Saturday were battling a 75-acre blaze in a remote part of San Gabriel Canyon. No structures were threatened and no injuries were reported, said Dee Dechert, a U.S. Forest Service spokeswoman. The fire, southwest of the Bridge to Nowhere, began shortly after 2 p.m. The cause was unknown. "Right now there is no containment and no estimated time of containment," Dechert said. Winds were calm Saturday night but could pick up today.

Fire crews were battling a 4,000-acre brush fire Monday morning in rugged terrain in the Angeles National Forest as the blaze forced officials to shut down the popular San Gabriel Canyon to Labor Dayvisitors. The Williams fire was just 5% contained as hundreds of firefighters from several agencies were trying to stop the forward progress of the flames, which sent a towering plume of smoke that could be seen for miles. Flames Monday morning were threatening mobile homes and other structures at the Camp Williams resort on the east fork of the San Gabriel River, the U.S. Forest Service said.

With firefighters expecting to extinguish a canyon fire above Azusa in the Angeles National Forest later today, officials have reopened an important access road to the forest. The blaze, which continues to smolder in the remote reaches of the San Gabriel Canyon area, has been surrounded after burning 4,075 acres, the U.S. Forest Service said. San Gabriel Canyon Road, a key forest corridor closed from Sierra Madre Boulevard to East Fork Road since the fire broke out, reopened late Sunday night.

San Gabriel Dam operator Herbert Romero led 16 engineers clad in hard hats and yellow vests down a long flight of metal stairs on Wednesday to a cast-iron wheel on a ledge overlooking a stream bed a few miles above Azusa. At 9 a.m., Romero turned the wheel, opening one of the earth-and-rock dam's two 123-inch-diameter valves. The ground rumbled and water blasted forth with a roar in a horizontal stream more than 200 feet long, as if from a mammoth rocket engine. The biannual release of water at a rate of up to 3,800 cubic feet a second was needed to ensure that the dam, as high as a 25-story building, would be able to control floods out of the San Gabriel Canyon's 200-square-mile watershed.

Authorities will limit the number of vehicles permitted in the off-road area of San Gabriel Canyon above Azusa and will charge a fee on Saturdays, Sundays and holidays starting March 16. The revenue will pay for increased patrol, new restrooms, signs and other improvements. Bill Woodland, recreation resource officer for the Mt. Baldy District of the Angeles National Forest, said fees will be collected at the Forest Service information booth on Highway 39 at the entrance to San Gabriel Canyon.

Organizers of a litter cleanup in San Gabriel Canyon in the Angeles National Forest are looking for volunteers to work Saturday. Registration for the project--sponsored by the U.S. Forest Service, the Los Angeles County Agricultural Commission and the Hughes Fullerton Employees Assn. Ecology Club--is scheduled for 7:30 to 9 a.m. at the Rincon Fire Station on California 39, about 10 miles north of Azusa.

The picnicker in the low-hanging Hawaiian shorts was dumbfounded. "I didn't know there was a law against cutting down a little tree," he said. "How're you going to have fun if you can't get any sunlight in there?" "This is a national forest," Forest Service Officer Larry Brown responded tersely. "You can't do that." A bystander had spotted the man flailing with a machete at some alder trees along the bed of the San Gabriel River.

Last year, Donna Thompson found a dinette set during the annual Operation Supersweep in San Gabriel Canyon. The year before that, Marie Lopez stumbled upon a bag of hypodermic needles. This year the pickup yielded more routine refuse: three tons of bottle caps, food wrappers, beer cartons and used diapers, all artifacts of the canyon's 3 million annual visitors.

The Angeles National Forest will be the beneficiary of a $45,000 grant to remove graffiti and litter from areas such as San Gabriel Canyon, which has been hit hard in recent years, a park official announced Wednesday. The U.S. Forest Service grant must be matched with local contributions of volunteer time and private contributions, said Janice Gordon, assistant recreation officer for the Mt. Baldy Ranger District.

More than 1,000 volunteers will pick up litter in San Gabriel Canyon on May 30 in a program sponsored by the county and the Hughes Fullerton Employees Assn. Ecology Club, according to Supervisor Pete Schabarum. The cleanup, called Super Sweep 1987, will start at 7:30 a.m. at the Rincon Fire Station on Highway 39, about nine miles north of Azusa. The effort will continue until 1 p.m. Participants will receive free T-shirts and refreshments.

A 13-year-old boy started the Morris fire, which broke out above Azusa and burned 2,100 acres last month, the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department said Wednesday. The district attorney's office has not decided whether to charge the youth, who was not identified. Details of how the fire started were not immediately clear, but the Sheriff's Department described the boy as being "primarily responsible for igniting the fire." The blaze broke out in San Gabriel Canyon on Aug. 25, the day before the deadly and much larger Station fire was sparked to the west.

Firefighters on Saturday were battling a 75-acre blaze in a remote part of San Gabriel Canyon. No structures were threatened and no injuries were reported, said Dee Dechert, a U.S. Forest Service spokeswoman. The fire, southwest of the Bridge to Nowhere, began shortly after 2 p.m. The cause was unknown. "Right now there is no containment and no estimated time of containment," Dechert said. Winds were calm Saturday night but could pick up today.

With firefighters expecting to extinguish a canyon fire above Azusa in the Angeles National Forest later today, officials have reopened an important access road to the forest. The blaze, which continues to smolder in the remote reaches of the San Gabriel Canyon area, has been surrounded after burning 4,075 acres, the U.S. Forest Service said. San Gabriel Canyon Road, a key forest corridor closed from Sierra Madre Boulevard to East Fork Road since the fire broke out, reopened late Sunday night.

Organizers of an annual trash pickup event in San Gabriel Canyon met Thursday evening to announce that their 15-year war on litter was successful. Maybe too successful. Operation Super Sweep, a post-Memorial Day weekend program that once drew over 800 volunteers, may have "worked itself out of business," said Tom Spencer, a Mt. Baldy District recreation officer.

Last year, Donna Thompson found a dinette set during the annual Operation Supersweep in San Gabriel Canyon. The year before that, Marie Lopez stumbled upon a bag of hypodermic needles. This year the pickup yielded more routine refuse: three tons of bottle caps, food wrappers, beer cartons and used diapers, all artifacts of the canyon's 3 million annual visitors.

Last year, Donna Thompson found a dinette set during the annual Operation Supersweep in San Gabriel Canyon. The year before that, Marie Lopez stumbled upon a bag of hypodermic needles. This year the pickup yielded more routine refuse: three tons of bottle caps, food wrappers, beer cartons and used diapers, all artifacts of the canyon's 3 million annual visitors.

Deep within San Gabriel Canyon lies a peculiar landmark, accessible only to the stout of heart. Five miles from the nearest road stands the Bridge to Nowhere, a 55-year-old, 150-foot-long monument to the power of nature. The Narrows Bridge, its official name, arches about 250 feet above the spectacular gorge--Southern California's deepest--for which it was named, the crowning jewel in L.A. County's grandiose plan to build a scenic highway up the east fork of San Gabriel Canyon.

Drive beyond the grit and graffiti of the freeways and head into the heart of the Angeles National Forest, up California 39 as it twists and turns above Azusa and leads to a mountain sanctuary of bears, hawks, mountain lions and wild trout. Barely five minutes from the freeway, at the boundary of the 693,000-acre forest, a burnt-orange graffiti sample on a granite wall of San Gabriel Canyon says "HIP."