Yorba Linda: Fire off Green River Road*

[Updated at 2:40 p.m.]

Firefighters are battling two fast-moving fires that have burned homes in Yorba Linda, Corona and Anaheim Hills and closed both the 91 and 57 freeways.

At least 20 homes in Yorba Linda have burned, and officials say the blaze is moving west. Several homes were also burned in Corona. That blaze jumped the 91 Freeway and was burning homes in Anaheim Hills.

A fire in Brea has surrounded Brea Olinda High School and  is burning around the 57 Freeway.

The larger of the two fires broke out in Corona off Green River Road and the 91 Freeway around 10 a.m.

Homes have been destroyed  along Golden Ridge Drive and Feather River Road, surrounded on three sides by dry, brush-covered mountains. Firefighters are still battling the blaze in the neighborhood of cul de sacs, hacking through a garage at another home that was aflame at noon Saturday.

Mike Goff, lives at 4876 Golden Ridge, next door to one of the houses that was destroyed.

Shortly after 9 a.m., Goff’s wife called to tell him that there was a fire in the aqueduct and brush about a mile from the home. The 50-year-old and his son went outside to water their home when they noticed that a palm tree in front of the house was on fire. When Goff climbed a 10-foot-ladder to try to extinguish the burning tree, he noticed his next-door neighbor’s house was on fire. He watched a neighbor knock on their door to alert the residents, who apparently were not aware their home was ablaze. “I didn’t even know their house was on fire,” he said.

Bob Klein slumped on a sidewalk in front of a smoldering house at 11409 Alder Creek Road, watching as firefighters hacked into the burning garage to salvage what was left of the home. “It just went so fast you didn’t even have time to think,” said the 53-year-old. He had been up for hours watering his home at 11453 Alder Creek Road. When he moved into the Santa Ana Canyon home 21years ago, there was nothing but dirt roads. Every year, when he saw smoke in the Santa Ana Mountains, he would dutifully pull out his garden hoses to make sure he was prepared. But the fire never approached the neighborhood. Today, he was startled to realize homes down the street from his were aflame. “I just couldn’t believe it, it’s just been chaos,” he said. “Most people are like me just keeping their houses wetted down. The other people just got the hell out. ... This is what really scares me. Not earthquakes, it’s these fires that will kill people around here.”

The blaze initially started as a brush fire in Corona on Prado Road, and quickly spread to a subdivision known as Dean Homes in the northwest part of the city. Ten homes were damaged, with at least five sustaining major damage.

--Christopher Goffard, Mike Anton and My-Thuan Tran

Comments

[Gil Payne]

This comment has to do with all fires in general. Here we are again in another fire disaster season. What I see time and time again is the risky places that too many people chose to live in. Wether rich or common folk, a fire is a fire. Fires do not discriminate. Montecito for example, serviced by a two lane, twisting, rural highway making it difficult for firefighting equiptment to manuver. Thick vegetation and trees serrouding lots of multimillion dollar homes as well as more modest homes. In the end, a perfect formula for disaster. Where are the officials who grant permits for this homes to be built in such risky terrain without some strick guidelines to require the homeowners to maintain a large clearance of vegetation and trees from the homes? Luckily, no lives were lost.
These rules of vegetation clearance should be mandated state wide since too many homeowners cannot take the enitiative to do it themselves or perhaps there are too many hoops a homeowner, such as the case in Lake Tahoe, before they can get a permit to clear the vegetation some commnon sense rule needs to be put in place here.

[Harold]

There will have to be multiple deaths from these canyon/hillside fires before the authorities move to deny building permits in these hard to service areas.
We are all paying for all the fire crews who are spending too many overtime hours and material trying to put out these fires.
It is dangerous for the fire crews as well as the inhabitants to continue building in the dangerous areas.
It will take a serious blow to get authorities to act in the public's interest.
Too bad.

[Bill Lenner]

It's easy to complain and just follow the politicians calls to make So California into a land of high rises, but we should resist the propaganda that developers put out.

The truth is that we have too many unsolved mysteries about the origin of our dangerous fires.

People should keep their eyes open and dare to be busy bodies during this kind of weather.

We've heard of actual arson, and campfires from people moving north or south to or from Mexico, along with fallen wires, and construction incompetency.

Just following the developers' will that we should remake So Cal as NYC will lead to a radical remake with substandard housing and huge political donations to the most corrupt politicians.

If you're worried about the cost of fighting fires, think about the amount the state and local governments will be dumping on that high rise development they've been talking about.

[LEE RIVAS]

When are we going to learn that fires are nature's way of cleaning out dead and dying vegetation so as to fertilize the land and thereby clear it for new growth? So it has been for millions of years.

Now man has interposed himself into these areas. Towns and cities have grown up where once nature ran free and the end result has been obvious.

In the end, the homeowners will rebuild on the same spot and "hope" it doesn't happen again, while the taxpayers know that it will.

[Rob]

I've been updating a google map with information collected from KNBC and phone reports from my relatives.

http://tinyurl.com/5atjvd

If you have any information to add, you can comment or edit that map yourself.

[LEE RIVAS]

When are we going to learn that fires are nature's way of cleaning out dead and dying vegetation so as to fertilize the land and thereby clear it for new growth? So it has been for millions of years.

Now man has interposed himself into these areas. Towns and cities have grown up where once nature ran free and the end result has been obvious.

In the end, the homeowners will rebuild on the same spot and "hope" it doesn't happen again, while the taxpayers know that it will.

[Rick]

On 70mph winds, the fires move into subdivisions. The Oakridge trailer park was not in a wildland fire hazardous area. Yes, tighter permitting and brush clearance are partial answers for some situations, but the cat is already out of the bag. Today's fires show that there are not blanket, simple answers. There are people who choose to live up in the chaparral-covered hills, and those who do not. If this thread goes on for a while, we will hear from both. There is no perfect safety. Thus far, we have a level of safety that has prevented large numbers of deaths. But I suspect that this is just luck, so far. Hopefully we will not learn otherwise when the assessment teams get into Oakridge, for example. In the meantime, pray for the firefighters' success and for the winds to calm, the first depending absolutely on the second. It's about all we and they can do.

[educate thyself]

My sister and her husband live in the Yorba Linda neighborhood on fire. They pay more in property and income taxes per year than most of you earn in a lifetime. The County does regulate vegetation. If there wasn't so much crime in the "lowlands" highly educated people who have grown wealth thru hard work wouldn't have to move so far away! Let's all educate ourselves, and stop blaming the very people that fund the government agencies, and subsidize our poor and sick.

[Greg]

I have read some of the most uneducated comments. First this has nothing to do with risky terrain or clearance if you look at the homes there was anywhere from 100 -200ft on 95% of the homes. Most of these tracks are less than 10 yrs old. This was the wind - Anaheim Hills was becasue the embers jumped a 8 lane fwy plus center divider which housed the fastrak.
I live in YL and our money and insurance will rebuild and we are the taxpayer.

[Chuck Methven]

I agree.....some very uneducated comments here about where people live and other tax payers having to bare the burden for people to live there. Property taxes are based on home values and I'm sure these people pay much higher taxes to live in these areas that may be more vulnerable to fire. However, I live in the Green River community where the Complex fire started yesterday and I can say that we are in a very low lying area, but are surrounded by the Cleveland National Forest. We were fortunate to have escaped this fire without damage to our home thanks to the efforts of the Corona Fire Department and other agencies from all over Orange County. There was a comment made about nature starting fires to clear the earth of old growth vegetation to make room for new growth. What I have a problem with is neglegence or the deliberate starting of fires by idiots that are sick in the head. I'm almost positive that our fire in Corona was not the act of nature. ENOUGH SAID!

[Andrea]

I too live in the Green River Community where the fire started. I would bet that the fire started from either some kids in the river bed screwing around or the homeless people that live down there. After I evacuated, I stayed at the Shell station for a while helping a poor woman who had just found out her attic had caved in. I witnessed a homeless man walking out from the community with all of his belongings. The river bed is easily accessable from the area down by the pool. No matter what, this is a tragedy, and no matter what caused it, I am more than willing to pay my taxes to help the poor, innocent people who lost their homes. My grandfather lives pretty far from any brush (a huge golf course, a street and 2 blocks of homes, separates him from the hillside in YL), and was evacuated. If he had lost his home, would you blame him for buying a home "too close" to the brush?

[A Reader]

It seems odd that the authorities are so quick to dismiss arson as a couse of the fire. Their logic is like this" "we have no clue what caused the fires, but we are sure that it wasn't arson". I smell orchestratged cover-up here (even though they may not quite know what are they covering up).

With American Southern border wide open, millions reckless migrants roaming the southland, and hundreds of thousands of disappointed/disgruntled day laborers, this is a disaster waiting to happen (or happening).

If they disrespect our national border and the immigration laws, what makes you think they will respect fire regulations in order to not pose a risk to homes of those that they dispise?

[I am white]

It's funny how the tone of this thread has racial, Mexican hating feelings buried within it. A majority of the people living in the hills of Yorba Linda that were victums of this fire are white and this thread has prejudiuce written all over it. This is not an immigration forum, I bet you love to eat at El Torito though in Savi Ranch! The people of Yorba Linda need to stop living in a bubble and bitching for every piece of bad luck that go's their way. You notice how you don;t see any other fire victums from other city at City Hall complaining about an unfortunate situation. Maybe they should focus on rebuilding and moving on instead of trying to point the finger all the time- it was the water district, it was illegal mexicans- and Rick, sorry your sister and husband are too rich paying all the poor people's programs I guess they are so educated they moved to the Hills to get away from all the crime, however accoriding to the other comments the illegals found them hiding in the Hills anyway. Bunch of stuck up racist jerks, I'm sure you are also disturbed about Obama.

[a lawyer who cares and has personal stock into this]

Look...I am not going to say that this was done by people, yet..that is speculation and hearsay...unlike most of you have...and like some of you, this is as personal to me as it can get. My family is from YLC, and it IS personal to me when my friends and family are directly involved in these emergencies. I know a few people who have lost their homes. I would be PISSED, if I found out that this was arson and even MORE pissed if I found out that it was due to Prop 8 or racism or anything so damn assinine that they are willing to flame up and burn over 90 homes, 180 with extensive damage and a HIGH SCHOOL...I will lobby HARD against ANYONE who is charged for arson in this case. because it churns my stomach to think that ANYONE with God given skin could find resolve or closure to their immature and senseless feelings if THIS is the cost. If THAT person is found, God have mercy on your soul that a judge resolves your fate before I do. I won't cause any harm to that person...but I will assure to everyone who lost their homes, I will see that that person goes to prison for a long time.

[a lawyer who cares and has personal stock into this]

Andrea-that is a bit accusatory don't you think? nobody is saying it isn't arson...even though the cops may be..but come on...don't point fingers just yet..that is speculation and assuming makes an ass out of u and me...let's just see what happens...but if it DOES include arson...I will do my best to get them into prison for the rest of their lives.