Favorable Winds Give Firefighters Big Break : Crews Save Small Communities Near Malibu but Other Major Blazes Remain Out of Control

A drop-off in Santa Ana winds and a welcome breath of sea air came to the aid of overworked firefighters in the hills above Malibu late Tuesday afternoon, enabling them to save two or three small communities whose residents were ready to flee.

One moment a wall of towering flame was charging down the eastern slopes of Corral Canyon and in the next it seemed simply to fade away, leaving nothing but smoke and drifting ashes.

In Ventura County, the 35,000-acre Wheeler Canyon-Ferndale fire turned westward after endangering homes on the northern fringe of Santa Paula.

“It looks like Santa Paula is safe,” said that city’s fire chief, Jim Bensen, “at least for the time being.”

But several Southern California blazes still burned out of control and firefighters kept wary eyes on the weather, aware that a renewal of gusting Santa Anas and abysmally low humidity readings could confront them with more trouble.

Los Angeles County fire officials grew more pessimistic late Tuesday evening as Malibu area winds picked up to an average of 20 m.p.h., gusting up to 35 m.p.h. Humidity was down again.

“We’ve got red flag weather,” said County Fire Capt. Gordon Pearson.

Worrying the crews were new spot fires just north of the Pepperdine University campus and near the Hughes Research Center nearby. There were other flare-ups above Monte Viento Drive in Malibu.

During the afternoon, ground crews aided by constant helicopter water-drop sorties made their stand in Corral Canyon as one finger of the angry Piuma fire came marching down the ridges of the Santa Monica Mountains from the northwest to imperil about 200 residents in the Malibu Bowl and El Nido settlements.

Los Angeles County fire officials had feared that the fiery front might sweep westward into Latigo Canyon and the Malibu Vista area.

But at least 30 engine companies were deployed around the community of Malibu Bowl. Four helicopters and four fixed-wing planes roared in one after another to drop water and retardant on the flames, making desperate use of the remaining daylight.

By nightfall, Pearson said the holding action was working. Bulldozer crews would continue to cut two large fire lines protecting Corral Canyon, he said, but hand crews would be allowed to go down the slopes for vitally needed rest.

“I’m feeling real confident,” Pearson said. But, he added, “Of course if the wind changes, we’ll have to move south and start all over again.”

1,000 Fighting Blaze

More than 1,000 firefighters were on the two blazes.

By dusk, the Santa Ana winds that had gusted up to 50 m.p.h. for two days and had destroyed more than 20 homes in Southern California while burning across more than 60,000 acres had given way to onshore breezes in the Malibu area at 5 m.p.h to 10 m.p.h. Northeast winds returned later in the evening, but had little sustained velocity.

County Fire Capt. Scott E. Franklin said he did not think that any structures would be threatened in the Malibu area--overnight at least. The situation could get critical again by noon today, he cautioned, if winds come up this morning.

Franklin said the Corral Canyon fire could have been “knocked out” before noon Tuesday if only there had been a few more fixed-wing aerial tankers available to help the helicopters make water drops. But, he said, much equipment had to be committed elsewhere.

The Piuma blaze, which on Monday night destroyed at least one home and a nursery and threatened to sweep through Pepperdine University before running into Corral Canyon on Tuesday, was declared 35% contained at 3,500 acres.

To the west, the Decker Canyon fire was 50% contained after burning 5,800 acres, destroying four homes and causing some late afternoon concern of its own at the Ventura County line.

About 4:30 p.m., that blaze broke across Mulholland Highway in the hills above Leo Carrillo State Beach and headed for a scattering of homes. But extra fire crews were moved to the scene to cut a firebreak while a helicopter doused the hillside with water. The flare-up was contained in about an hour and a half.

One firefighter suffered heat stroke Tuesday and was evacuated by air ambulance. There had been nine other injuries on both Malibu area fires, but only one of those was serious. It was suffered by a city prisoner on a fire crew who broke his leg.

On Tuesday evening, a California Highway Patrol officer manning a roadblock a mile and a half south of the Malibu Canyon tunnel reportedly escaped injury when his patrol car was struck by two large boulders that broke loose during a sudden flare-up in the fire on adjacent hillsides.

Both Corral and Latigo canyons were in the path of the October, 1982, blaze that went all the way to the ocean on a 12-mile front. Fifteen homes were burned to the ground in Latigo Canyon then. No homes were lost in Corral Canyon. During that weekend three years ago, 41 homes were destroyed by fires in Los Angeles, Ventura and Orange counties. Fifty mobile homes were destroyed at Malibu’s Paradise Cove.

Fire officials clearly were pleased that they were losing so few homes and other structures despite the vast acreage burned.

‘Protect the Structures’

“We have learned not to just fight the fire itself, but to go out to protect the structures,” said Jim Sanchez, chief of air operations for Los Angeles County Fire Department, who has been flying one of the five helicopters used on the Malibu blazes.

Roads into the Malibu fire area--particularly Encinal and Decker Canyon Roads--remained closed to all but emergency vehicles. The California Highway Patrol said Pacific Coast Highway and Malibu Canyon Road were open only to local residents.

That situation was expected to remain in effect until sometime today.

Pepperdine University, which was all but surrounded by the Piuma fire on Monday night, canceled classes on Tuesday because of the access problem.

Pearson noted that three Malibu area fires started within a short time of each other Monday morning and said, “Arson is always suspected in fires like these.”

The largest of the Southern California fires still roaring out of control was in Ventura County, where two fronts merged early Tuesday to sweep across 35,000 acres and threaten about 150 homes in the northern part of Santa Paula.

But on Tuesday evening, Santa Paula Fire Chief Bensen was able to say, “The danger to the north end of our town is past. We made a house to house stand . . . and the fire burned right through and then back to the area it burned over (Tuesday) morning.”

The so-called Ferndale, or Wheeler Canyon, fire was burning generally west of Santa Paula in the Upper Ojai Valley. At least eight homes were destroyed as well as five mobile homes, a small office building and 21 others structures such as barns and tack sheds.

Earlier, residents were evacuated from Sulfur Mountain Road, Koenigstein Road and Wheeler Canyon. Horses and other livestock were transported to the Ventura County Fairgrounds for safety.

The fire was burning out of control toward the southwest, said U.S. Forest Service spokeswoman Kathy Good.

College Threatened

Also in Ventura County, about 3,500 students, faculty and staff members were evacuated from Moorpark College, west of Moorpark, when the 10,000-acre Tapo Canyon fire got to within a couple of miles. The flames then moved away, but classes were canceled for the day and evening.

The college’s exotic animal compound, housing 300 to 400 animals, was not evacuated--but authorities said it would be if the fire continued to threaten the school.

That fire was generally moving northwest. No structures appeared to be in immediate danger. But the Simi Freeway, California 118, was closed from Madera Road to College View Avenue.

The Pioneer Fire, originally called the Hummingbird Ranch fire, in the eastern end of Simi Valley, had grown to 1,600 acres Tuesday afternoon, most of it north of the Simi Freeway. But the blaze was reported 90% contained. At one time it jumped the freeway into the city of Simi, briefly threatening half a dozen homes along Ardenwood Circle and Ardenwood Place.

In the Box Canyon area of Santa Susana Pass near Chatsworth, a blaze that resulted in the death Monday of one resident was reported contained at 1,600 acres. Johannis Leembruggen, 59, died of an apparent heart attack while trying to save his home.

Mountain Fires

Near Mt. Baldy Village in the Angeles National Forest, an 80-acre fire was controlled Tuesday morning, but a blaze in the Mt. Gleason area of the forest, 15 miles north of La Canada Flintridge was still burning out of control and had doubled in size to 1,000 acres.

A house and four sheds were reported destroyed in the latter blaze.

In northeast Los Angeles, a 20-acre brush fire destroyed two homes in the 500 block of East Fenn Street on Monday night, causing $162,000 worth of damage. That fire was quickly put down.

That blaze was believed to have started by arsonists and two suspects were arrested, said city Fire Department public information officer Gary Svider.

Firefighters rescued 86-year-old Harold Sigler, trapped by a chain link fence when flames destroyed his house.

“Before we could begin putting water on the fire the house exploded in flames,” fire Capt. Donald E. L. Betsworth said. “Then I saw this old man silhouetted by the light of the flames. The heat had driven him as far as he could go. . . . He was standing with his hands on the chain link fence, trying to find his way out.”

While firefighters worked to cut a steel chain fastening the gate, others wet them down with a fire hose. Sigler was led to safety, wrapped in a blanket and taken away by ambulance. He was not injured.

A small brush fire broke out near Travel Town in Griffith Park early Tuesday afternoon, but it was controlled by 13 city fire companies and helicopters after burning about two acres.

Another brush fire erupted Tuesday night in the Galster Wilderness Park area about one mile north of the BKK Landfill in West Covina. About 10 acres were burned, but no structures were reported threatened.