Fire crews seized a lull in the winds Friday to beat down wildfires as they braced for more of the hot, dry conditions that drove flames through cities and canyons, burning 700 structures, mostly homes, and more than 150,000 acres.
Four of 13 blazes that raged Tuesday and Wednesday from Ventura County to the U.S.-Mexico border were extinguished, and others were surrounded by fire breaks.But firefighters feared that the return of Santa Ana winds, which blow in from the deserts east of Los Angeles, could whip up new firestorms. Wind gusts to 40 mph were expected.
"This area burns very aggressively with no winds at all. I'm very worried," U.S. Forest Service officer Tom Harbour said at a fire camp in Altadena, where 118 homes and buildings were torched this week.
As he spoke, the fire no longer posed a threat to houses but raged out of control in the San Gabriel Mountains overlooking the suburb 15 miles northeast of Los Angeles.
Firefighters trudged up treacherous mountain slopes and through prickly brush to set backfires and cut firebreaks, working amid temperatures that reached 120 degrees.
Tim Kochen, a state forestry firefighter based in Riverside County, came off a 19-hour shift on the Altadena firebreak, took a quick shower at a base camp and planned a three-hour nap before heading out again.
"They're just so short of resources. We're going from one to the next to the next," said Kochen, who fought a San Bernardino County wildfire before being dispatched to the Altadena blaze.
The worst problem, he said, was the terrain: "It's treacherous just to get in there."
The National Weather Service said more hot, dry winds were expected Saturday but wouldn't be as strong as the 50-mph winds that whipped wildfires into walls of flame earlier in the week.
Authorities blamed arson for six of the fires and offered a $50,000 reward for information leading to arrests.