After several days of cooperation from the weather firefighters are starting to get the fires that have plagued southern California from the Mexican border to Ventura County under control:
LAKE ARROWHEAD, Calif. – Firefighters Sunday hoped to hold on to the strong gains they made against Southern California blazes, despite a forecast of warmer, drier weather and a continuing threat to some homes.
The blistering Santa Ana winds that whipped fires over more than a half-million acres earlier in the week were replaced by light breezes and even some rain on Saturday but another change in direction was expected to bring drier weather to Orange and San Diego counties.
“We’re still cautiously optimistic” of making progress, said Chris Caswell with the Orange County Fire Authority.
The fires have torched 1,790 homes but more than a dozen had been surrounded and nine others were 40 to 97 percent contained.
Based on the information in the LA Times-reported Google interactive map here’s the status of the fires that remain uncontained as of today:
| Fire | Acres Burned | % Contained |
| Witch Fire | 197,990 | 75% |
| Harris Fire | 86,500 | 65% |
| Ranch Fire | 55,401 | 97% |
| Santiago Fire | 27,521 | 40% |
| Grass Valley Fire | 1,140 | 95% |
| Slide Fire | 12,789 | 65% |
| Rice Fire | 9,000 | 90% |
| Poomacha/Mt. Palomar Fire | 45,000 | 40% |
| Ammo/Horno Fire | 21,084 | 90% |
The State of California has a rundown on all the fires here. People have started returning to their homes; firefighters are being transferred from Ventura and LA Counties to San Diego County. They’re not out of the woods yet. The weather may not continue to be cooperative. If the winds pick up, there may be another outbreak of fires.
Two of the fires have officially been declared arsons; several of the others have been attributed to downed power lines. The investigations will, no doubt, go on for some time.
Fires of this sort are foreseeable aspects of life in southern California as much as the mudslides that are all but certain to follow them or earthquakes. Those have been a part of southern California life as long as there have been human beings there to report them.
Recommendations and recriminations are also all but certain. I hope but doubt that two observations will be a part of them. First, southern California communities really need to engage in more planned development than has routinely been the case, taking fires into account. And, second, the residents of southern California need to be willing to tax themselves to pay for those things like firefighters salaries and equipment that are needed. This round of fires has strained those resources to the utmost. There really was no excess capacity. It could have been much, much worse. It still may get worse.
