Teenager Admits Setting Castaic Fire That Has Burned 15,000 Acres, 7 Homes

The largest brush fire to hit Southern California since the disastrous Malibu fires of 1993 roared out of control for a second day Tuesday, while a San Fernando teenager said he touched it off on an impulse, sheriff’s officials said.

The fire, which broke out about 12:30 p.m. Monday, had consumed more than 15,000 acres in a lightly populated mountain area north of Castaic by late Tuesday, destroying or damaging at least seven homes and dozens of vehicles and outbuildings, firefighters said.

Three firefighters have suffered minor injuries and a donkey trapped in a corral was singed.

Officials had no estimate of when the blaze--named the Marple Fire for the canyon where it started--would be contained. It sent up an ominous smoke cloud that towered into the sky high enough to be seen from the San Fernando Valley, 50 miles to the south.

The Golden State Freeway was open to traffic Tuesday after being closed on Monday, bottling up travelers for hours. However, the Old Ridge Route, which parallels the freeway, remained closed Tuesday to provide working room for crews repairing Southern California Edison power lines damaged by the fire.

The California Highway Patrol continued to maintain a command post along the heavily traveled route in case the fire threatened to cross back to the highway.

By late Tuesday, the blaze had moved into the Angeles National Forest south of California 138, where no major fire has burned since 1968, giving it plenty of fuel, said Fred E. Coe, spokesman for the U.S. Forest Service. The last major fire in that area consumed 55,000 acres.

Several crews attempting to stop the northern advance of the blaze were forced to pull out on Tuesday, officials said.

The acreage burned was the greatest in Southern California since the Malibu-Calabasas fires of 1993 charred 16,000 acres, said Inspector Greg Cleveland of the Los Angeles County Fire Department.

Firefighters were hampered in efforts to stem the blaze because much of Southern California’s state and federal firefighting equipment and manpower was deployed to other blazes in the state, Cleveland said. “There’s been a real competition for resources,” he said.

A 15-year-old San Fernando youth was arrested on suspicion of arson shortly after the fire broke out Monday.

The youth, who had been missing from home overnight in his father’s car, told authorities that the car broke down on the Golden State Freeway north of Castaic, sheriff’s deputies said. He told investigators that he was walking along the steep interstate highway in an unpopulated area in 100-degree heat when he suddenly just decided to set the fire for no particular reason, said Sgt. Heidi Clark of the sheriff’s arson investigation bureau.

He was quickly picked up by officers from the California Highway Patrol as he walked away from the flames. The youth is expected to be arraigned today at Sylmar Juvenile Hall where he is being held.

Meanwhile, more than 750 firefighters from federal, state and county agencies continued to battle the blaze in isolated, rugged terrain in the northern Los Angeles County area, said Dave Crall, a spokesman for the county Fire Department. They were backed by six water-dropping helicopters and seven fixed-wing air tankers.

At least four mobile homes were destroyed and three other dwellings, including a ranch house, have been damaged.

Injuries to the firefighters include heat exhaustion, a twisted ankle and a cut hand, officials said.

By late Tuesday, about 60% of the fire had moved into the forest area, where firefighters were having trouble navigating the steep terrain, and it threatened a number of oil and gas pipelines. “The county has almost all of their half of the fire under control, and the reason they could do that is they have roads. We don’t have roads in the national forest,” said Coe of the U.S. Forest Service.

Greg Olson, who fought heavy traffic to get to his home on the Old Ridge Route late Monday night, said he found when he arrived that his wife had packed their belongings into a pickup truck as the fire came within 100 yards of the house. “I noticed my fishing gear wasn’t in there, but my son’s Legos were,” he said.

Elsewhere, firefighters said they had nearly contained a stubborn arson fire near Azusa by late Tuesday afternoon.

The fire that began Saturday has destroyed 1,428 acres of brush and chaparral and cost $765,000 to fight. Officials Tuesday opened California 39 to residents for the first time since the fire broke out.

Edison has begun installing new power poles to return electricity to residents near the fire area, officials said.