Fire crews in Southern California are slowly gaining control over three wildfires that have destroyed dozens of buildings, burned more than 100,000 acres and kept countless residents from their homes for days.
On Friday, containment of the 51,884-acre Bridge Fire increased to 3% after days of moving north through the Angeles and San Bernardino national forests with crews unable to contain any part of its perimeter. More than 5,000 structures remain threatened by the flames and dozens of buildings have been destroyed.
Firefighters battling the Line Fire there and to the east and the Airport Fire to the south in Orange and Riverside counties have been counting on a break from days of extreme heat and low humidity as a chance to begin bringing the out-of-control blazes under control.
Between Wednesday and Thursday, the Line Fire was 21% contained. Overnight and into Friday morning, the fire grew by fewer than 200 acres to 37,743 acres, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection website.
Robert Rice of the Department of Forestry keeps a close eye on the remains of the Bridge Fire on Mt. Baldy on Thursday.
(Genaro Molina/Los Angeles Times)
Containment of the Airport Fire also increased Friday morning, rising to 8% from 5% the day before. The blaze was recorded at 23,494 acres. Crews there are assessing how many homes were destroyed in an isolated town tucked into the Santa Ana Mountains after the fire jumped the Ortega Freeway earlier in the week and raced through the town.
On Thursday, authorities began scaling back evacuations as the weather turned in their favor.
By the weekend, firefighters could be battling blazes with temperatures in the mid-70s in some places, according to National Weather Service forecasters.
“It's certainly a little less windy and a little more humid,” Bryan Lewis, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Oxnard, said Thursday. “That should certainly translate into better firefighting conditions.”
