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| According to the Ventura County Fire Department, the Thomas Fire was first reported Monday evening north of the city of Santa Paula. Video provided by Newsy Newslook |
SANTA PAULA, Calif. — One person was killed as strong Santa Ana winds drove a fast-moving fire Monday night that forced many to evacuate and left many in the dark.
The flames tore through 31,000 acres, or 48.4 square miles, in a matter of hours.
As
the blaze spread from the hillsides above Santa Paula, down toward the
small city and west to Ventura, thousands were forced to flee their
homes,150 structures were destroyed and reports continued to come in
about others on fire.
"I personally have never seen
structures destroyed in Ventura County like this. We're doing
everything we can to keep in front of this thing," said Rich Macklin, a
spokesman for the Ventura County Fire Department.
The wind, gusting 60 mph and higher earlier in the night, had started to pick up again, he said.
Earlier,
authorities said one person was killed while attempting to leave when a
car overturned. A firefighter also was injured, Macklin said. He was
taken to a hospital and was reported in stable condition.
“The
fire spread quickly, pushed by heavy east winds toward the west," said
Chief Mark Lorenzen of Ventura County (Calif.) Fire Department. ”We’re
basically leapfrogging our engines doing structure defense as the fire
proceeds."
First reported about 6:20 p.m. PT near
Steckel Park, the fire grew from 50 to 100 acres in minutes. Flames
quickly jumped Highway 150, which cuts a path from Ojai to Santa Paula, a
city of about 35,000 on the eastern end of the Ventura County.
By 2:30 a.m., the fire had spread to 26,000 acres.
“The
prospects for containment are not good, really Mother Nature is going
to decide when we have the ability to put it out because it is pushing
hard," Lorenzen said at a news conference late Monday night.
'Fast, very dangerous moving fire'
The
power went out in Santa Paula, Ventura and cities throughout the county
just before 10 p.m., as more neighborhoods were ordered to evacuate.
Authorities knocked on doors and woke people up to tell them to evacuate.
“It’s difficult to follow. It’s a fast-moving fire," Ventura County Sheriff Geoff Dean said late Monday.
"You
must abide by these evacuation notices. You saw the disaster and the
losses up north in Sonoma and this is a fast, very dangerous moving
fire."
Flames reached Ventura before midnight Monday, causing the city to issue mandatory evacuations.
“The
fire has spread incredibly fast. This is a very bad scenario,” said
Ventura Fire Marshal Joe Morelli, speaking from the city’s Emergency
Operations Center at Ventura Police headquarters. “The winds are still
picking up.”
Tens of thousands of city residents are without power, Morelli said. Police headquarters was running on a generator.
Morelli
said he neither he nor Fire Chief David Endaya, who has been with the
department for more than 20 years, had ever experienced anything
comparable to this fire.
“This is probably one of the most significant events in our city ever,” Morelli said.
Southern
California Edison spokeswoman Susan Cox said it was unclear just how
many homes were without power, and officials had no estimate for when
power would be restored.
"It's really difficult
because there’s a main power line source that runs along this ridge and
that’s what the fire’s burning down," Dean said Monday.
The Thomas Fire burns across several hillside along Highway 150 near
Santa Paula late Monday, threatening several neighborhoods.
ANTHONY PLASCENCIA/THE STAR
'The smoke was orange'
At
the Ventura County Fairgrounds, one of two shelters set up by the Red
Cross, two families and about seven people sat in the dark near the cots
by 10 p.m.
Roman Barita, a farmworker who lives in
a trailer park, knew it was time to evacuate when he climbed the hill
near his home and saw brilliant red flames.
"I’ve never seen that before," said Barita in Spanish, as his 17-year-old son translated.
Barita came to the shelter with his wife and son, and then contacted the others in his family.
He hoped his neighbors evacuated, too. “Because there’s little kids and families," he said.
Steve McKinney rents a home in Wheeler Canyon. He came out of his house at 8:15 p.m. and knew he needed to make a decision.
"The sky was just orange. The smoke was orange," he said, adding he could see a ridge engulfed in flames 20 feet tall.
McKinney
went to Ventura Missionary Church to pray and then came to the shelter,
though he planned to stay the night with family and friends.
“I thought I better come down here to see if they needed help,” he said.
Because of the strong winds and low visibility, no aircraft were flying Monday night, but that was expected to change at dawn.
Officials said they had asked for eight air tankers and a dozen helicopters to help fight the blaze.
The plan Tuesday is to "work edges of the fire to keep it out of the neighborhoods," Lorenzen, the fire chief, said.
With
winds like this, it makes it harder for firefighters, he said. But a
lot of what they can do is what they’re doing: Getting ahead of it and
doing evacuations.
Ventura and Santa Paula school districts said campuses would be closed Tuesday.
The
Humane Society of Ventura County, Ojai, was accepting large and small
animals. Earlier Monday, some people took horses to the livestock area
at the fairgrounds trying to escape the smoke and fire in Santa Paula.
Ash
Spann stood outside one of the livestock barns cooing to her horse
Kody. Spann lives in Ventura and boards three horses at Willow Creek
Ranch outside of Santa Paula.
As she drove back toward Ventura with her horses, she said she was happy to see clear air again.
"We
were two canyons from the fire and the smoke from the cinders was
blowing down," she said. "We're going back to see if we can get more."
Follow Cheri Carlson, Megan Diskin, Tom Kisken and Arlene Martinez on Twitter: @vcCheri, @megandiskin, @tomkisken and @avmartinez
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