Day four of California fires sees possible break with weather (Oct 24 AM)

By Karyn Chenoweth Oct 24, 2007, 13:37 GMT

A firefighters walks the fire line near Camp Pendleton, California, USA as seen on 24 October 2007. More than 500,000 people were evacuated from their homes in San Diego County due to wildfires that have engulfed Southern California since early Sunday morning EPA/ANDREW GOMBERT

On the fourth day of the massive fires in California, the exhausted firefighters and residents are hopeful that Wednesday everyone will get a bit of a break — an expected dying down of the fierce Santa Ana winds that has fanned the state's explosive wildland blazes.

Forecasters say the Santa Ana wind that comes from the desert will begin to weaken late Wednesday afternoon, followed by rising humidity and cooler sea breezes.

CNN reports this morning that the 16 wind-fed wildfires have destroyed nearly 1,300 homes and forced a half-million people to flee.

Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff toured the evacuation center at Qualcomm Stadium in San Diego.  "If the weather cooperates, maybe we can turn the tide," he said.

There have been reports in the media that firefighting crews were expecting additional firefighters and equipment to arrive from other states, mostly throughout the West.

Orange County Fire Chief Chip Prather told various reporters that firefighters' lives were threatened because too few crews were on the ground. He said a quick deployment of aircraft could have corralled a massive blaze near Irvine.

"It is an absolute fact: Had we had more air resources, we would have been able to control this fire," he said.

The fires have burned 410,000 acres, or about 640 square miles, causing at least $100 million in damage. Twenty-one firefighters and at least 24 others have been injured. One person was killed by the flames, and the San Diego medical examiner's officer listed four other deaths directly due to the blazes too.

The AP reports that the state's top firefighter "said Prather misstated the availability of firefighters and equipment. Eight of the state's nine water-dumping helicopters were in Southern California by Sunday, when the first fires began, along with 13 air tankers, said Ruben Grijalva, director of the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection."

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger dismissed the criticism when questioned by an ABC News reporter, and praised the rapid deployment of fire crews and equipment across a region from north of Los Angeles to the Mexican border.

"Anyone that is complaining about the planes just wants to complain because there's a bunch of nonsense," he said. "The fact is that we could have all the planes in the world here — we have 90 aircraft here and six that we got especially from the federal government — and they can't fly because of the wind situation."

Thousands of people packed evacuation centers, where many had an agonizing wait to find out whether their homes had survived. At the Del Mar Fairgrounds in northern San Diego County, which was converted into a shelter, many stared at television sets blaring reports from the fire lines and damaged neighborhoods.

Evacuation orders continued Wednesday. Residents of the San Diego County communities of Fallbrook and Julian, an area devastated by a 2003 wildfire, were ordered out of their homes.

Officials also were evacuating De Luz, an unincorporated community north of Camp Pendleton that was being threatened by a wildfire burning on the Marine base. The fire also closed Interstate 5 and the Metrolink commuter rail, snagging the morning commute.

The worst damage appears to be in San Diego County, where five blazes continued to burn. The largest fire had consumed 196,420 acres — about 300 square miles — from Witch Creek to Rancho Santa Fe, destroying 650 homes, businesses and other buildings. Other hard-hit areas included San Bernardino County, where hundreds of homes burned in the mountain resort communities of Running Springs and Lake Arrowhead.