Huge Fire Shuts I-80

A mammoth forest fire that grew to 15,000 acres Sunday shut down Interstate 80 and a major rail line and threatened homes in a tiny Sierra community before winds drove the blaze back into the wilderness, officials said.

Battalion Chief Jim Hoffmier of the California Department of Forestry said the raging fire forced mandatory evacuations of 42 homes in Floriston about 10 miles east of Truckee.

The fire began about 12:08 p.m. in the Glenshire area just east of Truckee, California, and was spreading eastward up the Truckee River Canyon along I-80 toward Floriston, Hoffmier said.

“This thing got massive so quick, we’re going to be here a while,” Hoffmier said.

The blaze raced to within a couple hundred yards of Floriston before a southwest wind sent the fire back into the wild, Hoffmier said.

One home and a railroad trestle were destroyed and two firefighters were hospitalized for heat exhaustion, Hoffmier said. There were no reports of other injuries.

The fire cast a heavy pall of smoke over parts of Reno and Carson City, Nevada. Motorists heading west were being stopped at Truckee, he said. Eastbound drivers were being stopped at the Nevada state line.

A Truckee elementary school was converted into a shelter, but most evacuees went to Reno to avoid the fire area, Hoffmier said.

Battalion Chief Tom Donnelly of the Reno Fire Department said the blaze amazed firefighters by growing to 12,000 acres in a matter of three or four hours Sunday afternoon.

He said it would normally take a day or two for a wildfire to become that big, but the driest wildland conditions in more than half a century made the situation ripe for a fast-moving fire.

“It grew to 12,000 acres faster than we’ve seen any fire in the past,” Donnelly said. “That doesn’t bode well for this summer.”

I-80 was closed about 2:30 p.m. at the Nevada line after the fire jumped from the south side of the interstate to the north side.

Heavy smoke from the blaze caused poor visibility for motorists, and blanketed the Reno area about 12 miles to the east and the Carson Valley about 60 miles to the southeast.

The fire also forced the closure of the transcontinental rail line through the Truckee canyon used by both Union Pacific freight and Amtrak passenger trains.

Firefighters struggled with winds blowing from 30 to 35 mph. Humidity was at only 6%, making for very dry conditions, officials said.

“There is nothing we can do about it. Mother Nature is in control,” said Nevada Division of Forestry Capt. Al Hyde.

The blaze was concentrated in a rugged canyon area, which made it difficult for emergency vehicles to reach. “You wouldn’t want to put people up there anyway,” he said.

However, as long as the winds don’t reverse direction, Floriston and the nearby communities of Glenshire and Hirschdale should be out of danger.

“The winds are a daily event around here,” Hoffmier said.

The fire scared some Glenshire residents by burning to within about two miles of the community, an employee at the Glenshire General Store told the Associated Press.

“There’s so much smoke it looks like a big nuclear bomb went off,” said Jenni Charles.

Floriston resident Debbie Baldwin fled her home with her two children, two dogs, a bird, family photographs and a few other possessions.

“I live on the south side of town and right there was a wall of fire coming right at us,” Baldwin told AP. “You could hear it. You could feel it.”

Ten helicopters, nine air tankers and 17 hand crews along with more than 200 firefighters tackled the fire, Hoffmier said.

Hoffmier said firefighters were also being hampered by steep terrain. The winds made the air attack difficult by blowing retardant off target.

The rugged expanse between California and Nevada has been the site of massive wildland fires in the last couple of years. Last June, more than 12,000 acres burned 15 miles north of Reno after lightning strikes.

And in July 1999, again just of east of Reno, more than 10,000 acres of sagebrush and pines burned with a half-mile of a major highway.

The cause of Sunday’s fire is under investigation, Hoffmier said.

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The Associated Press and Times staff writer Dan Morain contributed to this story.