New fires erupt around L.A. County as dangerous fire weather continues

Southern California is facing another day of dangerous winds and dry conditions that sparked new blazes across a region in a month marked by unprecedented fire losses.

In the last day, hundreds of weary firefighters battled a massive blaze near Castiac and a smaller but unnerving one in the Sepulveda Pass in Brentwood and Bel-Air. Damage from the fires has been kept at bay due to aggressive water drops and winds that while strong did not match those seen during the Jan. 7 firestorm.

The Sepulveda fire was the latest blaze in a nerve-racking week as Southern California headed into a fourth consecutive day of red flag fire weather warnings. The alerts caution that conditions are ripe for fires to ignite and spread rapidly.

There have been red flag warnings in some part of Southern California for 14 of the last 17 days. The stretch started Jan. 7, the day the Palisades and Eaton fires began their devastating spread, leveling swaths of Pacific Palisades and Altadena.

Thursday will be another day of critical fire weather danger.

“Any new fires can grow fast and out of control,” the National Weather Service posted on social media. “Have a plan, especially if you are in a high fire risk area.”

Overnight, officials were dealing with the Sepulveda fire, which broke out off the 405 Freeway.

Shortly before 2 a.m., the Los Angeles Fire Department said the fire, which burned 40 acres, had stopped spreading. Officials lifted an evacuation warning for parts of Bel-Air, including homes along Casiano Road and Chalon Road, as well as Moraga Drive, which is lined by multimillion-dollar homes. Authorities earlier lifted an evacuation warning for a part of Brentwood including the Chalon campus of Mount Saint Mary’s University.

To the north of Castaic, the Hughes fire charred more than 10,000 acres and forced thousands to flee their homes.

The Hughes fire started off Lake Hughes Road just before 11 a.m. Wednesday and quickly prompted evacuation orders in and around Castaic Lake, which by afternoon extended toward Ventura County to the west and near Sandberg to the north. More than 31,000 people were ordered to evacuate, and warnings were issued to 23,000 others.

Crews reached 14% containment on the 10,176-acre blaze shortly before 10 p.m.

Santa Ana winds will strengthen and peak during the day Thursday, weather service meteorologist Ryan Kittell said. The weather service has extended its red flag fire weather warning through Friday at 10 a.m. for much of the counties of Los Angeles, San Diego, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino and Ventura.

“We’re still in the middle of this extended period of extreme dryness, and we’re looking at this next wind enhancement picking up,” Kittell said. Humidity has dipped below 10%.

Peak gusts Thursday were forecast to be a bit stronger than anticipated earlier in some locations. Gusts on Thursday could reach 45 mph in the western San Fernando Valley, Oxnard and the Grapevine section of Interstate 5; 53 mph in Ramona; 54 mph in Acton; 55 mph in Fillmore and Idyllwild; 59 mph in Santa Clarita; 62 mph in Thousand Oaks; 68 mph in Beaumont; and 69 mph in Alpine.

With the air so dry — and not moistening up overnight — it is a “really concerning period for humidities,” Kittell said. Plants and other fuels are “ready to burn.”

However, rain is on the horizon for Southern California. Precipitation could start as early as Saturday afternoon and last until Monday night.

Rainfall could total nine-tenths of an inch for Covina; nearly three-quarters of an inch for downtown L.A., Long Beach and Santa Clarita; two-thirds of an inch for Redondo Beach; three-fifths of an inch in Fillmore and Canoga Park; and about half an inch in Thousand Oaks and Oxnard. Eleven inches of snow could fall on Wrightwood, and four inches along the Grapevine section of Interstate 5.

The Hughes fire will continue to consume firefighters on Thursday.

Air quality was in the unhealthy range in the area of the Hughes fire, according to the Ventura County Air Pollution Control District. An alert was issued Wednesday afternoon for Camarillo, Fillmore, Moorpark, Oxnard, Piru, Santa Paula, Simi Valley and Ventura.

A smoke advisory was also issued for a wide swath of northwestern L.A. County from the Santa Monica and Malibu coastline to the south up through the San Fernando Valley, Santa Clarita and into the Castaic Lake area.

Moments after the Hughes fire exploded, L.A. County Deputy Dist. Atty. Jonathan Hatami said he raced out of the Michael Antonovich Antelope Valley Courthouse in Lancaster and drove back to Santa Clarita, where hundreds of kids were being evacuated from West Creek Academy as the sky overhead darkened with smoke.

“You had some parents crying. You had younger kids … they were crying. You could see the smoke from the school. Everybody is kind of on edge,” said Hatami, whose children are 8 and 10.

The veteran prosecutor, whose wife is a Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy who had been dispatched to help with evacuations, said his entire family was experiencing “fire fatigue” after more than two weeks spent waiting for wind-driven flames to threaten their home.

“It’s a lot. I love California. I love Los Angeles, but this is definitely stressful,” he said. “It’s hard to go to work when you’re worried your house could burn down and your kids are at school, and your wife is out there, and you don’t know what’s going to happen with her.”

The fire was burning about five miles north of the county’s Castaic jail complex, forcing deputies to move 476 inmates from the tent-like barracks at Pitchess Detention Center to the concrete North County Correction Facility. Both buildings are part of the same jail complex that is within an evacuation zone.