(The following story by Laurie Phillips appeared on The Tribune website on June 8.)
SAN LUIS OBISPO, Calif. — Fire crews are expecting to have the 7,500-acre fire blazing near Gaviota fully surrounded by Thursday night, but they do not yet know when it will be completely extinguished.
And rail traffic for Amtrak passengers and freight will likely be closed for up to two weeks while fire crews replace burning railroad ties that cross a 65-foot-high, 700-foot-long bridge near Gaviota State Park. They are scraping off the creosote-treated sections of timber to salvage the metal beneath, said Capt. Charlie Johnson, Santa Barbara County Fire Department spokesman, and will replace the burnt sections with new ties.
In the meantime, Amtrak passengers will continue to shuttle train passengers from Guadalupe and San Luis Obispo by bus. How long freight traffic would be affected was not known Monday night.
By late Monday, the fire was about 40 percent contained. Flames continued a slow creep northeast, pushed on by a convergence of warm northwesterly winds that sailed through the canyons. Four buildings burned: a modest home and three other buildings, including a shed and an old garage at Vista Del Mar Elementary School in Gaviota.
No new injuries were reported. One firefighter hurt himself Sunday when he slipped and fell, according to CDF.
On Monday, Johnson said, “some of the work has gone very well, (and) some of the work has gone very slow because of the terrain.” More than 1,000 firefighters from San Diego to Fresno – including about 130 from San Luis Obispo County – continued building fire lines on steep, rocky hills and dropping water on the fire.
Because San Luis Obispo County operates under a mutual aid agreement with neighboring counties, firefighting personnel from other areas have filled in while local employees are fighting the Gaviota fire.
“We’re doing fine within the county, let’s put it that way,” said CDF/County Fire Capt. B.J. Reed. “If something happened today, we’d be covered.”
Investigators have not yet determined the cause of the blaze. It began at 11:55 a.m. Saturday near the Highway 101 rest stop near Gaviota, Santa Barbara County fire officials have reported.
The fire remained about four miles east of former President Ronald Reagan’s Rancho del Cielo – a 688-acre compound that once served as the Western White House – and fire officials didn’t think it would advance unless the winds shifted. Hundreds of people who lived in surrounding homes along Refugio Road were evacuated Saturday and allowed to return a day later.
“This is a fire where we can’t afford to drop our guard or be complacent,” Johnson said. “This area has a history of nasty fires.”
The Refugio canyon area last burned 49 years ago, when conditions were similar to those fire officials are seeing this week. High winds swept through brush that hadn’t burned in years. That fire burned farther west than this one.
Traffic along Highway 101 _ which was reopened Sunday night after being closed a day before _ was traveling at normal speeds on the northbound side and moving slightly slower in the other direction, according to the CHP. Johnson said pockets of fire could be seen a few hundred yards off the roadway, but most burned deep in the canyon.