MIDDLETOWN With 100-percent containment expected at 8 a.m. today of a fire that scorched an estimated 550 acres near Middletown, about 300 firefighters continued to combat remnants of the blaze throughout Wednesday.
“Containment means we have a line around it. Now we have to mop up and make sure everything is put out from that line to 200 feet in,” California Department of Forest and Fire Protection (CDF) Chief Todd Durham said Wednesday.
“There are still 300 people here and still four helicopters laying retardant. We”re doing the same thing yesterday, today and tomorrow (today).”
Durham said that CDF expects to complete its work in the area on Friday.
The 300 firefighters, down from a total of 500 at the height of the fire, were using 200-foot-long laterals (small hoses) connected to the main hose on Wednesday to battle hundreds of small flare-ups in the crevices and hills of the fire site, which is about four miles south of Middletown.
Typical of the “looking for smoke” firefighting work was the extinguishing of a small blaze on a hill overlooking Highway 29 by Steve Millosovich, Corrine Barkley and Peter Skidmore of the Napa-Lake-Sonoma CDF unit. The work consisted of dousing flames that resulted when a “flashpile” erupted. The blaze was aided by a discarded plastic 2,500-gallon household water tank.
“We were mopping up the other side and our division called and said there”s a flare-up over here,” Millosovich said. “There was plenty of fuel for it here. It looks like there was probably a garbage dump, which became the flashpile. We found an old sock, a car jack and fiberglass.
“We can get the fire down in two or three minutes, but then you gotta spend X amount of time mopping up.”
The grasses and real fine brush, called “ground fuel,” have been “slicked off” by burning, said Millosovich, which reduces the possibility of any immediate repeat of a spreading fire.
There have been no injuries among the firefighters who responded to the blaze, which began Monday afternoon, Durham said. One of the three structures he reported destroyed was a residence, a mobile home that was uninhabited at the time.
Contact John Lindblom at jlwordsmith@mchsi.com.
