Anaheim Grass Fire Burns to Within 100 Feet of Residences

A grass fire in the steep eastern hills of Anaheim blackened three acres and burned to within 100 feet of homes on Sunday before Anaheim and Orange County firefighters managed to contain it.

The firefighters were aided by high humidity and low wind, officials said. Although flames came within 100 feet of homes on Birchwood Street in the East Hills development, Anaheim Fire Battalion Chief Charles Kanenbly said the houses were never in danger because all had fire-retardant roofs.

“If they’d had shake shingle roofs, we would have been dancing the Mexican Hat Dance out there,” Kanenbly said Sunday.

It took 35 firefighters and a bulldozer about 2 1/2 hours to encircle and extinguish the blaze that broke about 2:25 p.m. in the rugged hills east of Weir Canyon Road and south of the Riverside Freeway, Kanenbly said. A second 20-man Orange County Fire Department brush fire strike team was on standby.

“It burned three acres on fairly steep, inaccessible terrain,” Kanenbly said. “The dozer could only cut a (fire) break around half of it. It was really a steep son of a gun . . . . Fortunately, we had high humidity and low wind to help us.”

Cause of the fire was not immediately known, but fire officials said it may have been started by children playing in brush near the homes. “I can tell you it wasn’t started by lightning and it wasn’t started by some kind of electrical problem,” Kanenbly said.