Residents in Tahoe Get Hour to Sift Debris

Jun 30, 10:35 AM

Current Headlines: By Scott Lindlaw Associated Press

SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, Calif. -- People who lost their homes and belongings to a devastating wildfire were allowed to briefly return to their burned-out neighborhoods Friday as authorities declared the blaze mostly contained.

With evacuation orders lifted in many parts of town, residents of the area where 254 houses were destroyed were given an hour to sift through the wreckage under the eyes of a police escort.

Keith Cooney, who works for a local title company, saw his rented home of three years engulfed in flames on a local news broadcast Sunday and came back to find only a bent metal garage door standing. He spotted a concrete swan given to him by a former neighbor in New Orleans but not the fireproof box with his important papers.

"I gotta dig through this. This is going to be unbelievable," Cooney said as the wind blew through the blackened, charred leaves of several young aspen trees in the remains of his front yard.

The smoke-free skies that greeted Lake Tahoe Friday morning confirmed the word from fire officials that the threat to thousands more homes and the region's tourist trade was subsiding after five days.

After a second straight day of mild winds allowed firefighters to surround the blaze, U.S. Forest Service commanders said they planned to reduce their force by a fourth. The blaze was 70 percent contained as of Friday, while the amount of land burned was 3,100 acres, or 4.7 square miles, according to U.S. Forest Service incident commander Rich Hawkins.

"Firefighters came in this morning and felt even more comfortable about the approaching containment of this fire," Hawkins said. "I'm feeling pretty good about it."

Hawkins said authorities had pinpointed what started the blaze and would announce the precise cause later Friday. He said he believed it was accidental.

Officials cautioned that it still was too early to declare victory, with forecasters saying winds could pick up again Friday and hot spots still smoldering in some areas.

"Don't be complacent. There are still hazards out there," Kit Bailey, a U.S. Forest Service chief, told hundreds of firefighters Friday morning. "It's going to be a long, brutal summer."

Fire crews also reported progress on a 19.4-square-mile blaze north of Los Angeles that has destroyed 12 homes. For the first time since it began Monday, firefighters on Friday actively attacked flames instead of merely trying to corral them. The fire, located in steep canyons south of the San Joaquin Valley, was 65 percent contained.

"We're going right after it and it looks like we're getting a handle on it," said Virgil Mink with the U.S. Forest Service.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger visited the scene on Friday and thanked fire crews for their efforts, warning that the rest of the fire season could be rough.

"This is just the beginning," Schwarzenegger said. "This is the first time that California has seen fires that early in the year."

In the Lake Tahoe Basin, the decision to let homeowners back into the burned-out streets about seven miles from the lake where all the destroyed homes are located was welcome news to residents who had waited all week to see the devastation for themselves.

A few people were so determined to sift through the ashes that they defied the evacuation orders and returned repeatedly on bicycles earlier Thursday. They were arrested for trespassing, said El Dorado Sheriff's Deputy Phil Chovanec.

Evelyn Taylor and her husband, Carl, of Aptos, returned to the remains of their vacation home Friday accompanied by an insurance adjuster. The couple owned the house for 20 years. Nothing was left but a cinderblock wall.

"When my husband and I drove down the street, we both just lost it. But we will rebuild," Evelyn Taylor said. "We're thankful it wasn't our primary home."

Contributing: Laura Kurtzman, Scott Lindlaw and Robert Jablon

(c) 2007 Deseret News (Salt Lake City). Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.