English /// 06/23/08
SACRAMENTO, Calif.
-- Thunderstorms
sparked as many as 75 wildfires in a wilderness area in far Northern
California on Saturday as officials farther south got close to
containing a blaze that destroyed several homes and forced thousands to
evacuate. Storms overnight Friday were responsible for the large number of
fires in Shasta-Trinity National Forest, near Redding. Those fires range in size from less
than an acre to more than 750 acres.
None
immediately threatened homes, said Forest Service spokesman Michael Odle. Teams
moved in Saturday on the two largest fires.
South
of San Francisco, a fire that burned homes and closed a stretch of highway was
90 percent contained, said officials of the California Department of Forestry
and Fire Protection.
Officials
had expected full containment on Saturday, but hot weather and stubborn hot
spots kept fire crews busy. Cal Fire now expects the fire to be fully contained
on Sunday. So far, it had charred 630 acres, or less than a square mile.
Evacuation
orders were lifted Saturday, a day after roughly 2,000 people fled their homes.
About
650 firefighters were working in hot, dry weather to contain the blaze, which
destroyed as many as 15 buildings, including several homes, and closed scenic
Highway 1 in Santa Cruz
County for hours, fire
officials said.
The
cause of the fire was still under investigation, Van Gerwen said.
It
was the third major blaze to hit Santa
Cruz County
in the past month. A 520-acre blaze charred destroyed 11 buildings in the Santa Cruz Mountains, and a fire near Corralitos
covered more than 4,200 acres and destroyed about 100 buildings.
To
the south along the coast, firefighters worked against a nearly 80-square-mile
fire in a remote part of the Los Padres National Forest
in Monterey County. It was about half contained
Saturday.
In
New Mexico, hundreds of firefighters battled blazes in the northern and
southern parts of the state that have charred more than 100 square miles,
including more than 4,000 acres on a ranch owned by media mogul Ted Turner.
In
a remote southeastern part of the state, lightning-sparked fires have scorched
more than 95 square miles of mainly desert landscape.
The
largest fire, 20 miles southwest of Hope, doubled in size Friday because of
gusty winds and has charred more than 40,000 acres, or about 64 square miles.
It was 35 percent contained. Two other blazes burning about 30 miles west of Roswell merged Saturday,
and have blackened nearly 32 square miles.
In
northern New Mexico,
another fire that began as two blazes burned nearly 7 square miles on Turner's
Vermejo Park Ranch.
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