Officials Feared Runaway Wildfire Had Potential to Reach Malibu

• Porter Ranch Blaze Was Headed Southwest until Wind Changes Altered Its Behavior

BY ANNE SOBLE

Powerful Santa Ana winds had already whipped one wildfire into an uncontrollable frenzy when a second fire broke out Monday morning on Oat Mountain above Porter Ranch and quickly grew as 35 to 45 mph winds, with gusts as high as 70 mph, fanned the flames.
Malibuites who know the community’s fire history joined county fire officials in recalling the Wright and Clampitt fires that also started near Oat Mountain and traveled over two mountain ranges, through Chatsworth to the ocean, in September 1970. That wildfire claimed 135,000 acres and destroyed 226 structures.
As the Malibu Surfside News went to press, the fire had claimed over 13,000 acres and at least 20 structures. More than 3000 people had been evacuated from hundreds of homes. The fire is not yet under control, but containment is expected by Saturday, as long as the wind and weather cooperate.
An all-out aerial assault, including the leased SuperScoopers that had just arrived in Los Angeles County, helicopters, and the DC-10, and intensely focused ground crews kept losses down.
A shift in winds Tuesday reduced the risk the Sesnon Fire in the Porter Ranch area would follow its 1970 predecessor. The fire, described in its first few hours as “a blowtorch we can’t get in front of” by a county fire official, took turns inland rather than march to the sea. A flare-up west toward Simi Valley was an unknown variable as The News went to press.
Though Malibu was 20 miles away from the flames, smoke and ash followed the southwest thrust of the Santa Anas before nature came to the rescue of weary fire crews and Monday night’s winds fell short of 60-plus mph forecasts.
The seriousness of the potential danger to Malibu from the Sesnon blaze was reiterated by Los Angeles County Fire Chief P. Michael Freeman at press conferences at 4:40 and 6:30 p.m. on Monday.
Freeman said, “This fire has the real potential of moving all the way down to the 101 freeway and perhaps even as far as Pacific Coast [Highway].”
“[The fire] can go from here to the ocean in a matter of two to three hours,” said Los Angeles County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky at a press conference, and match the the October 1978 Kanan Fire that burned 25,000 acres and 230 homes in its two-and-a-half hour push from Ladyface Mountain to Broad Beach.
The threat from Sesnon kept local fire crews on alert. County fire department spokesperson Maria Grycan said Malibu had received augmented staffing as soon as Santa Anas were forecast.
An additional strike team was staged at Pepperdine University, another in Agoura Hills, which could have been in the path of a southwest-moving Sesnon Fire, as well as one at Camp 8.
A fourth firefighter was assigned to Malibu Stations 70, 72 and 99 to assure added personnel if the crews were called out. Grycan said patrols staffed with a captain and a firefighter reconnoitered the coastal area on Monday when the danger was most acute.
Local residents were urged by county officials to monitor news reports on the fire and be prepared to take appropriate action if fire lines began to travel down traditional paths through the Santa Monicas to the ocean.
Although the Marek Fire in the East Valley posed no evident danger to the local coast before its near containment, it was a classic example of a wind-driven blaze that took its toll before firefighters could meet it head on. One fire official at the scene said, “Wind is king here, it’s dictating everything we are doing.”
The twin blazes, the first conflagrations of Southern California’s autumn wildfire season, were the largest of several that erupted across the state this week, burning over 27,000 acres from San Diego County to San Francisco Bay.
Malibu’s most devastating blaze last year, the Corral Fire, occurred in November, and many of the scars are still healing.
Local wildfires used to occur once every five or six years, even as far apart as a decade or more. They now are becoming multiple annual events in the Southland.
Malibu and other fire-prone areas desperately need rain, but most long-range forecasts are grim. Add the drought conditions to the increased frequency of Santa Ana winds, and there is the formula for repeat performances of a drama that no one wants to watch, let alone try to withstand.