Fire consumes a structure as fighters battle the blaze early Monday morning, Oct. 13, 2008, north of Los Angeles. Intense Santa Ana winds swept into Southern California and whipped up a 3,700-acre wildfire early Monday, burning mobile homes and industrial buildings and forcing the evacuation of eight patients from a nearby hospital. (AP Photo/Mike Meadows)
Wildfires burn homes, kill man in Los Angeles area
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Two wildfires driven by strong Santa Ana winds threatened neighborhoods near Los Angeles on Monday, killing a man, destroying several dozen mobile homes and forcing frantic evacuations. A second person died in a head-on crash on a freeway entrance ramp in traffic snarled by smoke and flames.
Firefighters were struggling with a 5,000-acre blaze in the San Fernando Valley's northeastern corner when a new blaze erupted at midmorning a few miles to the west in mountains above the Porter Ranch area and quickly grew to 2,000 acres as wind blew up to 45 mph, with gusts reaching 70 mph.
"It is a blowtorch we can't get in front of," said Los Angeles County fire Inspector Frank Garrido.
Fire officials could not immediately estimate how many homes in Porter Ranch were in the fire's path. Flames burned furiously at midday just across a road from one development of luxury homes. Fire officials alerted other communities as far south as Malibu, 20 miles away.
The first fire was burning where neighborhoods abut rugged canyonlands below the mountainous Angeles National forest. The fatality there was an apparent transient living in a makeshift shelter, officials said.
About 1,200 people were evacuated because of the Marek Fire, which was just 5 percent contained. Los Angeles County fire Capt. Mark Savage said 37 or 38 mobile homes were destroyed by that blaze early Monday.
"We could have had an army there and it would not have stopped it," Los Angeles Fire Department Battalion Chief Mario Rueda said. "Wind is king here, it's dictating everything we are doing."
Olive View-UCLA Medical Center, the hospital closest to the Marek Fire, evacuated eight of its most fragile patients to other hospitals. Spokeswoman Carla Nino said those patients — six newborns, a heart bypass patient and another described as "medically fragile _were all on ventilators and were the most difficult to transport.
About 180 patients remained at the hospital as officials waited to determine if the fire would actually approach.
The dry and warm Santa Ana winds typically blow into Southern California between October and February. As they whistle through canyons and valleys, they pick up speed, drying out vegetation and hastening the spread of any fires that break out.
Because of the fires, the South Coast Air Quality Management District, an anti-pollution agency, says air quality may reach unhealthful levels in the area and urged people to avoid outdoor activities.
The Marek Fire began early Sunday during the first significant Santa Ana of the season, and about 1,000 firefighters from multiple agencies were deployed. The cause was under investigation.
"This is what we feared the most," said Savage. "The winds that were expected, they have arrived."
The blaze diminished overnight, but authorities warned it was a sleeping giant. Fierce winds returned before dawn and sent it raging again.
Flames jumped the Foothill Freeway, which was closed in both directions for about a three-mile stretch in northern Los Angeles between the 118 Freeway and Interstate 5 amid the morning rush hour, officials said.
"That was quite a jump, that's an eight-lane fire break," said fire spokesman Inspector Paul Hartwell.
A motorist was killed on a freeway ramp after vehicles started turning around and exiting to avoid the fire, Garrido said.
The Red Cross said about 500 people registered at an evacuation center at San Fernando High School. Agency spokesman Nick Samaniego said some evacuees had seen news footage of their homes burning.
"You can imagine, it's a devastating situation," he said. "A lot of people on pins and needles waiting to hear news about their communities."
Jim Williams, 72, grabbed his medication, comb and toothbrush and was out of his house within five minutes. The longtime resident said the area hadn't burned since 1974.
"I didn't expect it again," Williams said. "The trees there at the time burned and didn't grow back, only brush. I felt relatively safe that if the brush burned, it would only be a small fire, nothing like this."
Most schools in the area were closed Monday.
Also Monday, firefighters contained small blazes near Santa Clarita in northern Los Angeles County and near a Santa Paula oil facility in Ventura County.
Associated Press writer Thomas Watkins contributed to this report.
Santa Ana wind conditions as seen from space.
Two large wildfires burn uncontrolled north of Los Angeles, California. The blazes, known as the Marek fires, have burned over 3700 acres and caused the evacuation of more than 1200 people. Furthermore, at least 30 mobile homes were destroyed.

One confirmed fatality has been reported and described as an unidentified transient who had been using a cardboard shelter beneath a freeway overpass. However, the ''Associated Press'' reports a second related death from a traffic accident.

Authorities expect to order more evacuations before the fires can be brought under control.

Fires started Sunday due to Santa Ana wind conditions in the San Fernando Valley and Angeles National Forest on the northern outskirts of Los Angeles. Affected communities include Porter Ranch and the Lopez Canyon area.



Santa Ana winds as strong as 65 miles per hour fanned the flames, which jumped the eight-lane 210 Freeway. Both the 210 Freeway and 118 Freeway were closed during Monday morning rush hour. Firefighters have contained smaller blazes that occurred elsewhere in Southern California near the Los Angeles suburb of Santa Clarita and in neighbouring Ventura County.

Local resident Glenn Bell told ''Reuters'' about his last minute evacuation.  "The sparks were flying down on us," he said, recalling how a locked gate nearly trapped him and his family, "and as I'm busting the gate... I see the cypress trees that are right next to our house on fire."

Los Angeles County fire inspector Frank Garrido described the problem as "a blowtorch we can’t get in front of," according to ''The New York Times''. "Wind is king here, it’s dictating everything we are doing," he continued.

Scott Stephens of the Center for Fire Research & Outreach at the University of California, Berkeley calls Southern California's Santa Ana winds "some of the strongest, most severe fire winds in the world."

Among the problems caused by Santa Ana winds, which blow from the nearby Mojave Desert toward the Pacific Ocean, is a tendency for hot embers to leapfrog and start new fires.  Santa Ana conditions tend to occur from autumn through spring and can reach peak speeds of 70 miles per hour (113 kilometers per hour).