Earth Protect Blog

By Sam Metz, Janie Har and John Antczak

The Associated Press

SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, CALIF. » Favorable weather helped firefighters trying to save communities on the south end of Lake Tahoe from an approaching wildfire, but officials warned Wednesday that stiff winds and dry conditions mean that homes in the California-Nevada alpine region are still in danger.

“We lucked out a little bit yesterday with some of the winds that didn’t come up quite as hard as we expected them to,” Tim Ernst, an operations section chief for the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, told firefighters in a briefing. “We were fortunate the fire did not make as strong a push into Tahoe as it did the previous day.”

The Caldor fire remained about 3 miles south of the recently evacuated city of South Lake Tahoe, moving northeast toward the California-Nevada state line, said Henry Herrera, a battalion chief for the agency, which is also known as Cal Fire. Crews tried desperately to keep flames away from urban communities, where houses are close together and shopping centers, hotels and other structures would provide even more fuel for a fire that so far has been feeding on trees, grasses and scattered homes and cabins.

“We’re still not out of the woods. The fire is still moving,” he said.

The fire has been burning toward Lake Tahoe from the southwest along California 50, climbing over a Sierra Nevada summit and descending into the Tahoe Basin.

Thick smoke has enveloped the city of South Lake Tahoe, which is all but deserted at a time when it normally would be swarming with tourists. On Monday, about 22,000 residents and thousands of others from neighboring communities jammed the city’s main artery for hours after they were ordered to leave.

City officials said only a handful of residents defied the evacuation order.

Meanwhile, officials prepared for the next possible phase of the firefight. The South Tahoe Public Utility District asked people to turn off hoses, irrigation systems and sprinklers to ensure that wells can pump at full capacity.

That means “the minute a firefighter hooks into a hydrant that they are getting full pressure, and as much water as possible is coming out,” said Shelly Thomsen, spokeswoman for the utility district.

As flames moved toward the Heavenly ski resort, officials turned on the mountain’s snowmaking machines to increase humidity and slow down any flames.

To his wife’s dismay, John Rhodes, 60, stuck around to defend the couple’s neighborhood in an unincorporated area south of South Lake Tahoe that burned in the 2007 Angora fire.

Rhodes and his neighbors, including several off-duty firefighters from other California agencies, wrapped homes in hoses and ran sprinklers to create a perimeter around the neighborhood to supplement official firefighting work nearby.

As a rookie firefighter, he admitted to having butterflies.

“I was anxious about how I would stand up near the hot spot. These guys are trying to get me all coached,” Rhodes said, pointing toward his firefighter friends.

The Caldor fire not only emptied out South Lake Tahoe but parts of neighboring Stateline, Nev.

Nevada casino regulators said gambling was suspended at the Hard Rock Lake Tahoe, Montbleu Resort, Harrah’s and Harvey’s Lake Tahoe, where officials said their casinos were closed to the public but their hotels were housing firefighters and displaced employees.

The fire has destroyed at least 700 homes and other structures and scorched nearly 320 square miles since breaking out Aug. 14. It still threatens at least 33,000 more homes and structures. It was 20% contained on Wednesday.

More than 15,000 firefighters, with help from out-of-state crews, were battling dozens of California blazes, including another monstrous blaze in the same area.