Southern California:

At 3 p.m., the National Weather Service's high wind warning expired, and gust began to taper off. It was still plenty windy, said weather specialist Bonnie Bartling, but the 60 to 100 mph gusts that had roared down the canyons in the last few days would largely disappear Tuesday night.

Winds in the Newhall pass, which on Sunday and Monday clocked in at more than 70 miles per hour, were down to a relatively tolerably 48 miles per hour on Tuesday, Bartling said.

"We're kicking into a weaker Santa Ana tomorrow around noon," she said late Tuesday.

"The high pressure system is going to move far enough to the east where it will turn off the Santa Ana spigot," said Bill Patzert, a climatologist for the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in La Canada-Flintridge.

Patzert said that by Friday, and for sure by the weekend, "we should be back to our marine layer in the morning." Temperatures that reached 95 degrees in Pasadena shoudl be down to the mid- to low-70s by Saturday, he added.

On Tuesday, Pasadena reached 95 degrees, Patzert said. By Saturday, temperatures in that city should plummet to the mid to low 70s, he said. That's just a snapshot of what will happen in the region, Patzert said.

"It will be a lot cooler, a lot more humid, and that will really slow down these fires," Patzert said.

-- Hector Becerra

Ramona:

The San Diego County Sheriff's Department reported making several arrests for looting, including two in Ramona near the origin of the Witch Creek Fire. Dist. Attorney Bonnie Dumanis warned of vigorous prosecution.
Looters, she said, are "criminals without a conscience." Looting is second-degree burglary, a felony punishable by up to three years in state prison, she said.

-- Tony Perry

Oceanside:

Not the ideal vacation perhaps, but for at least 60 families in the harbor area of the Oceanside waterfront, camping at the beach seemed a good alternative to hotels.

State park rangers told R.V. and camper owners flooding into the area Monday night that the rules had been suspended for the duration of the fires:

They could camp in the parking lot meant for boat trailers for free, so long as they didn't let their dogs on the beach, lifeguards said.

Karen Perez, 39, of Fallbrook, her husband and their two retrievers, were among those who took advantage . They had parked their camper in one of the spots, flanked on each side by a line of R.V.'s, some double parked.

Most of the makeshift community were fellow Fallbrook evacuees, she said: "We've been comparing notes."

Perez said the couple was getting a little bored, but the mood at the parking lot was mellow and amiable. People sprawled on the beach nearby, swimming, or flopped on folding chairs around their campers trading stories.

Other non-campers had flocked to the Oceanside beach and pier to seek relief from the throat-choking air, strolling along the pier, surfing, or just sitting on the beach and taking breaths.

The sun, however, was a small sinister red disc over the ocean peering through the smoke. The sky--darker by the moment as the flames roiled in Pendleton--was a strange, heavy, liver-grey color and seemed hang just at the tops of the palm trees and the boat masts, a kind of dusk at 3 p.m.

"This is not what we had in mind when we got the camper," Perez admitted, eying the ash raining down on her two leashed retrievers, who kept tangling themselves among the folding chairs.

Just before 4 p.m., a cry of "water!" broke the sleepy mood. Joanne Chaffee, a nurse from a nearby Oceanside neighborhood, had rolled her dull black Toyota Camry into the parking lot and opened the trunk to hand out water .

She had come straight from her job as a home-health care worker, and was still wearing her medical smock and ID, and her face was covered by an industrial-type mask. It was not her first trip. The previous night, she had brought restaurant pasta, salad and cupcakes to the evacuees, spending in part her own money, and giving them away from a cart.

She got many takers, "Thank you! Thank you!" they said, as she passed the bottles out, and "I'm a home-care nurse too!"

A teenage girl in a blue tank-top, flip-flops, and legs covered with beach sand came up, asking if Chaffee knew where she could buy a mask. She and other evacuees seemed to treat Chaffee as their unofficial boss and concierge--maybe it was the nurses' uniform.

Chaffee seemed to accept the role. She told the girl which stores might still have a few, then recommended the best bet, and gave her the address.

"One of my patients said, 'You are being a mother again,'" she said shrugging. "It's that maternal instinct."

-- Jill Leovy

Orange View Fairgrounds evacuation center:

Ruben Gurrola, 53, the patriarch of his family, has lived in the Lake Arrowhead area for 27 years. He has been buying his $150,000 house near the rim of The World High School for 8 years. Monday morning he decided to pack up the family and voluntarily evacuate to the center in San Bernardino. He spent his first night in his truck because, "It was full of the most important documents of his life," those of his marriage, his citizenship papers, and his forthcoming homeowners papers (deed).

The family also went through the 2003 fire. They were at a soccer game in San Bernardino and didn't make it to their home in time to save their dog, Pug. But the home survived then and the Gurrolas are hopeful it will again.

It was better this time, as the family was home to gather together, but, "I hope it does not become a routine."

Gurrola's daughters, Margarita, 21, was worried about her one-month-old son, David. "You know there's just so many people around and I just worry about germs or an illness spreading and my son getting sick from it. But it's been safe so far. It's not your house but I guess it'll be home for the next few days."

-- Francisco Vara-Orta

Cooks Corner:

Firefighters are going to light a backfire in hopes of keeping the blaze from crossing Live Oak Canyon road. The fear is that if it's not stopped here, the fire could run unchecked all the way to Rancho Santa Margarita.

OC Fire Chief Mike Rohde, who is in charge of the firefighting effort in the Lake Forest area, said, "We're going to be in real trouble if it gets past us here."

A fire strike team was sent in along the road to make sure that the backfire itself doesn't jump the road.

-- Mike Anton

At 3 p.m., the National Weather Service's high wind warning expired, as winds began to taper off. It was still plenty windy, said weather specialist Bonnie Bartling. But those 60 to 100 mph gusts that had roared down the canyons in the last few days would largely dissapear Tuesday night, leading into today(WED).

The Newhall pass, which on Sunday and Monday had gusts that clocked in at more than 70 miles per hour, had gusts of relatively tolerably 48 miles per hour on Tuesday, Bartling said.

"We're done with the strongest winds. We're kicking into a weaker Santa Ana tomorrow around noon," she said late Tuesday. "The winds are diminishing."

There will still be wind advisories in the mountains and parts of the Santa Clarita Valley, she said. But the strongest gusts should be a shadow of what they once were.

On Thursday, more good news as the high pressure system over the Great Basin above Utah moves farther east, toward Colorado. With that, the offshore breezes flowing into the Pacific in the general direction of the Santa Anas, should begin to switch to onshore breezes.

"The high pressure system is going to move far enough to the east where it will turn off the Santa Ana spigot," said Bill Patzert, a climatologist for the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in La Canada-Flintridge. "At that point, we'll see our normal weather, which is an onshore flow."

-Hector Becerra

San Diego:

All evacuation notices have been lifted for Del Mar, Solana Beach and Chula Vista.

-- Tony Perry

Arrowbear-Running Springs:

Two 21-man U.S. Forest Service crews -- the Feather River Hot Shots and the Breckenridge Hot Shots -- sipped boxed Starbucks coffee in the parking lot of Blondie's Bar and Grill as they waited for water-dropping planes and helicopters to clear a safe path for them. The crews planned to hike in when it was safe to build a containment line with their saws and pulaskis, an axe-like tool used to fight wildfires.

"We're just getting a feel of what the fire is doing... it's a pretty steady line of fire moving down the southwest," said Hot Shot Capt. Ray Torres of the Feather River group. "We've got some folks scouting to see how we can get in there to actually start attacking this thing."

Jason Foreman, lead saw on the Breckenridge Hot Shot crew, said the clouds of smoke signified the peak burn period of the day.

"It's so erratic, we haven't been able to get out there. ... We might spread ourselves too thin," said Foreman, 29. Most recently, Foreman said his crew had worked the initial attack on the fire around Lake Isabella in California and the Gray's Creek Fire in Idaho in early September.

"They were nothing like this," he said, eyeing the smoke along the ridgeline.


-- Maeve Reston

Malibu:

Some 90 percent of Charter Communications cable, Internet and telephone customers in Malibu are without service, after fiber-optic lines burned in the Malibu fires, the company said in a statement. Service will return gradually, but should be completely in place by this evening, the company said.

Washington, D.C.:

Trying to avoid a repeat of the failures of Hurricane Katrina, the White House is taking pains to respond quickly to the escalating emergency posed by the Southern California wildfires. But a leading Democrat says the Bush administration has shortchanged funding for removing dead trees and dry shrubbery that provided the fuel for the fast-moving blazes. And a leading Republican member of the state's delegation called on Congress to quickly provide $1 billion in emergency funds to help pay the costs of firefighting and disaster relief.

President Bush plans to visit the Southland on Thursday, and Homeland Security Sec. Michael Chertoff and David Paulison, head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency arrived in the state today. But as the White House scrambled to stay on top of the crisis, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said the administration has not put a high enough priority on preventing catastrophic fires in the West. "We have fought for years during this Bush administration to have money for wildfire suppression," Reid said. "It takes effort to prepare the landscape so that these fires don't burn the way they have been."

After the fires of 2003, Congress authorized $760 million a year for "fuel reduction"--clearing away dead trees. But less than half of that has been provided.

-- Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar and James Gerstenzang

El Toro:

About 272 people, mostly from Fallbrook or Foothill Ranch, spent the night at El Toro High School's gym on hundreds of blue, green and red cots set up by the American Red Cross. During the day some took naps on the cots or crowded around a TV, in their socks or barefoot; some said they felt like they were in their living rooms.

Shirley Viramontes, 44, of Fallbrook was happy to spot a familiar face: Kenneth Samuels, 67, who lived in her Summer Ridge apartment complex. He had told her to evacuate Monday, but she could not bring herself to leave. Instead she and her 8 year-old daughter, Gina, spent the night in a Dodge van at the entrance of their complex, until the smoke became too thick about 4 a.m. Samuels told her he called home and heard his answering machine, "so that's good news." She replied, "I hope to see you at home."

About 30 people at the gym were seniors, evacuated from nursing homes or assisted living facilities, including Emerald Gardens and Fallbrook Terrace. "I didnt hear any complaints from [the seniors] even though we were stuck in a car for 2 hours," said Remylyn Massip, 36, who helped in the move. "They thought it was a field trip."

-- My-Thuan Tran

Modjeska Canyon, east Orange County:

Los Angeles Times reporter Janet Wilson, who has lived in a creekside stone house in Modjeska Canyon in Orange County for nearly nine years, returned from her wedding Monday evening to find her home threatened by the Santiago Fire. Today, she gave this account to Times staff writer Tony Barboza:

"I got married on Saturday, and there's a good chance my home was destroyed this morning.
I was married in a lakeside chapel in my mother's small town in New Hampshire. It was fantastic. Two weeks ago, 40 of my women friends held a wedding shower in Modjeska Canyon. We sat out on my friend's porch staring at the blue sky and beautiful chaparral-covered slopes that we all knew and loved so well. Today I saw that same area engulfed in 75-foot flames.

The good news is as far as I can tell nobody has been hurt. Three of my neighbors were among the 12 firefighters that were required to deploy their emergency fire-retardant tents as flames overtook them Monday, but they also escaped injury.

My mom told me the day after the wedding that there were seven fires in Southern Californa. At first it seemed like my house would be okay, but each time I changed planes I received increasingly disturbing messages on my cell phone about shifting winds and fire trajectories.

By the time I was on the tarmac in Denver, a neighbor told me that people were being evacuated. I called an editor, who told me that Modjeska Canyon was in danger, but the fire hadn't reached the homes.
As the plane took off, I started to cry. Both my husband, the man I love very much, and a kind elderly lady from Newport Beach, also got emotional trying to comfort me. But soon I straightened myself out. There was no point crying and collapsing now.

I am not the most religious person in the world, but I just glued my eyes shut and started praying for my neighbors. When the plane took off, I just tried to sleep.

As we flew into John Wayne Airport at around 6:35 p.m., we tried to make out Santiago Peak and Modjeska Peak from the plane window. But we couldn't see through the smoke and darkness.
Driving to Modjeska Canyon, we had to travel through thick smoke near Foothill Ranch and Portola Hills. But as we entered the canyon, the air was clear and even smelled sweet. I was relieved that my house was okay and my animals were out of there, thanks to my neighbors.

I started to pack some essentials - insurance forms, one piece of my grandmother's china - but I wasn't too worried. I didn't even grab any wedding presents - or gift list for thank you notes. In the canyon, everything seemed fine.

But then sheriff's deputies arrived, calling fom voluntary evacautions from their car's loudspeakers. I looked out my sideyard and saw the dull red glow getting brighter and brighter. Having covered fires before, I became extremely anxious and wanted to go. My husband wanted to stay. I told him we're married now so we need to go together. In the end, I waited longer than I wanted. He stayed longer than he wanted.

Just before we left, I leaned against the wall at the top of my stairs and quieted my mind. It's a little ritual I do each time I go on a trip. Someone once told this would allow me safe journey and protect my home.

This morning, I grabbed quotes from fleeing neighbors for the newspaper. I saw the head of the volunteer fire department standing by the side of the road, helpless.

It was an eerie experience as a reporter because you're trained to observed areas you don't know. But I knew every inch of what I saw today. I know the hills and the houses. It's an extraordinarily close-knit community. People who live outside the canyon joke that it's a cult.

We see it as our little bit of heaven away from all the rest of Southern California. And at the same time, we know that fires are the hazard of living here.

Now, I'm on Santiago Canyon Road, which I've driven thousands of times. The familiar view that has always made me feel safe and let me know that I'm home is now blotted out by a gray and black cloud.

Oceanside:

Oceanside hotels are full but not to bursting. By mid-afternoon, the Oceanside Day Inn on the freeway still had four rooms left, in stark contrast to the previous night when clerk Vanessa Canela said she turned 50 people away.

Tuesday, however, some guests left to go home or stay elsewhere, and Canela said, and requests for rooms dwindled. As of Tuesday afternoon, not one hotel had called her with a referral, she said, a sign that things had eased elsewhere as well.

A few other hotels did report full occupancy. One of them, the Oceanside Travelodge, booked its last remaining room at about 2 p.m.

The previous night, said owner Vinod Patel, he had turned many people away. "One was an old man with a cane. I didn't know what to do. I had no rooms, so I turned him away. I had no choice."

Like other hoteliers, Patel had loosened his strict anti-pet rule for the crisis. "I have ten dogs and three cats here now," he said.

On Monday night, people had gone as far as Anaheim to find rooms, but by Tuesday, they were beginning to flow back.

One told Patel prices were too high in Orange County, so he came back. Travelodge rooms rent for about $77 a night.

Normally, hotels in Oceanside are at about 60% occupancy on weekdays this time of year, Patel said.

Patel and his wife Sushila said they thought the reason the evacuation appeared to go so well was because most refugees were staying with friends. Sushila Patel's aunt, for example, had left an evacuation area to stay with a friend of a friend who was hosting as many as 30 people because of the fire.

Case in point: Earline Dean, 52, and her husband 54, who, after evacuating from Fallbrook with their small dog in a cage, had driven all over San Clemente looking for a hotel. They got a reservation, then were rejected because of the dog, Earline Dean said. Finally, a neighbor of a friend who lives in San Clemente--a complete stranger --took them in for the night, she said, adding: "So wonderful."

The Deans were settling into the Travelodge for their second night away from home. Their auto club insurance would cover the bill, Earline Dean said.

-- Jill Leovy

Fire officials at their command center in Riverside said the Mt. Palomar fire has exploded to 20,000 acres and could threaten the famed observatory at the top, one of the world's largest telescopes. They also said two fires have broken out in Camp Pendleton, the Wilcox Fire at 1,200 acres and the Ammo Fire at 350 acres. The Ammo fire has raised concerns because it is at the base of San Onofre Peak and climbing up toward an array of telecommunications equipment at the top. The San Onofre nuclear power plant is on the other side. Chief of Operations Chief Bob Green said he was asked by the governor to send in air tankers to lay down water between the fire and the communications equipment on top.

-David Kelly at Calfire Command Center in Riverside

San Bernardino:

By Tuesday afternoon, the number of evacuees at the Orange View Fairgrounds in San Bernardino had grown to nearly 1,500 from about 900 Monday night. Most of the arrivals were coming from the burned areas near Lake Arrowhead.

Children were playing and people milled about in tank tops and shorts under a blazing sun. In the parking lot, dozens of tents and RVs were set up among rows of cars. One woman was sunbathing in the bed of a pickup truck.

An animal shelter, made up of dozens of cages lined up under a large tent, held dogs, cats, rabbits and birds.

Two large warehouses have been converted to dorms, filled with cots and tables providing fire information and services to evacuees. Inside evacuees napped, read books and watched a large graphic projected on the wall plotting the progress of the fires.

-Francisco Vara-Orta in San Bernardino

Los Angeles County Fire officials said a new fire was reported at 3:40 p.m. at 1216 West Avenue Y-8 near the Antelope Valley Freeway in the Acton area. The fire, which had burned several acres, was threatening homes in the Cedar Croft and Brian Glen areas. At least 240 have been dispatched to fight the fire, which is 5% contained.

-- Andrew Blankstein

At the Del Mar Fairgrounds and Race Track in north San Diego County, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger arrived late Monday to talk to elderly residents sleeping in one of the buildings after being evacuated from fire areas.

By 11 p.m., 1,000 military-style cots arrived from nearby Camp Pendleton, enough for anyone who wanted one. By Tuesday morning, 160 National Guardsmen were on hand to help the estimated 1,500 to 2,000 San Diego residents taking refuge in two buildings at the fairgrounds.

Indeed, there were so many people offering to volunteer and help evacuees that by this morning racetrack officials were begging the media to put out the word that no more volunteers were needed.

This afternoon, a line of cars a block long idled outside the grandstand building as their drivers waited to drop off donations that filled their vehicles. The racetrack's secretary, deluged by calls from people offering help, answered the phone all morning, "I'm sorry, we don't need any more volunteers."

And employees of the Villa Rancho Bernardo nursing home, who had brought more than 200 frail elderly residents to the facility Monday, were loading them into ambulances to take them to several convalescent facilities in Orange County that had space and were out of harm's way.

At the fairgrounds, people arrived from wealthy and poorer parts of northern San Diego. All said that hotels and motels were booked for 50 miles around.

In the grandstand building, designated for refugees with pets, one man sat next to a regal Irish wolfhound. A woman had a parrot perched on a chair. Others had brought a pet snake, a rat and a chinchilla.

Many said they received "reverse 911 calls" telling them it was mandatory to leave their homes. One 62-year-woman, who declined to be named, said she was unemployed as a minimum-wage horse groomer, and had no insurance on her home. She had arrived in dusty jeans in her 1983 Chevy pickup with her two barn cats, Itzi and Nuisance, her thoroughbred horse, her sister, who works at a thrift store, and her 92-year-old mother.

Stay-at-home mother C.J. Ellerby, 37, said it was a "little scary" to wake up and get a reverse 911 call telling her to evacuate from her $160,000 mobile home in Escondido. She had already received a recorded call at 5:30 a.m. Monday that her son's Escondido school was closed because of the fires. Ellerby could think of only one hotel in the area that allowed dogs, and it was booked. The nearest available hotel was in Orange County.

"You can't love a pet and leave it behind. That's not right," she said. It would be hard to afford a hotel room for more than a couple of nights on the salary of her husband, who makes industrial pumps. "It would have been a financial thing to go to a hotel," she said.

So she and her husband and two children, ages 5 and 3, and their two dogs, a golden retriever mix named Ranger and a pitbull great dane mix named Hazel, headed to the fairgrounds Monday morning. They took little more than three days of clothing, and the hard drive of their computer.

"Compared to Katrina, this is very well organized. Katrina was a joke," said Ellerby, a stout woman in pink flip flops. She said that with a hurricane, New Orleans knew days in advance that a potentially devastating storm was coming. "You don't get a warning with a fire. You just don't."

Things had gone so much smoother in San Diego than in New Orleans, in part because people could pack up their cars and go, Ellerby said. Her family had been given cots to sleep on at the racetrack and whatever food and water they needed. A volunteer passed by to offer toothpaste and tooth brushes.

"The help of everyone has been incredible," said Andrea Brass, 57, from Del Mar Highlands, who evacuated with her mother, Sylvia, 83, and her companion, Abraham Secemski, 84. Andrea Brass, wearing a necklace with three diamond solitaires, said she took her jewelry, sterling silver, papers, photographs and mink coat. They had called motels, but all within 50 miles were booked. A sheriff's deputy had directed them to the racetrack.

They decided to leave the racetrack this afternoon because of her mother's lung conditions. They were taking her to a nephew's home in San Pedro to get away from the bad air. The track was clean: volunteers cleaned the bathrooms several times Monday night, leaving them sparkling, Andrea said.

Throughout the night, doctors and nurses consoled a few Alzheimer's patients who shouted out in the darkness, or became belligerant -- elderly residents from Villa Rancho Bernardo skilled nursing home who were confused. One nurse consoled a confused elderly man who kept saying, "I have to go to the university!"

"The volunteers were unbelievable. They couldn't feed you enough" Brass said, adding that she was constantly offered snacks, water and medical help, including oxygen tanks for her mother. In the evening, everyone got a dinner with chicken and sautéed vegetables. "It's a nightmare because houses are burning. Here I couldn't ask for a safer, better place."

The biggest complaint: There was no wi-fi so that people could use their laptops to look at Google Earth and see if their house was still standing.

-- Sonia Nazario

As the Harris fire pushed closer, John Smith, a public affairs official at the Veterans Home of California in Chula Vista, wasn't taking any chances.

There were 372 veterans, average age 80, to look out for. So at 2 a.m. today, he and a home administrator drove 5 ½ miles up to the fire line to question the battalion chief directly.

"I wanted to talk to this guy eyeball to eyeball," said Smith, 60, a special representative for the state Department of Veterans Affairs.

The battalion chief told him not to worry. But five hours later Smith drove up again. This time a different chief provided even more assurance.

Smith said the risk from the massive fires were dismissed by some home residents who itched to see it first-hand.

"One guy came up to me and said, 'I was at Normandy. I was at Guadalcanal. I was at Iwo Jima.' These guys are not intimidated by what they describe as a 'little fire,'" he said.

-- Tracy Weber

Two Jeeps filled with National Guardsmen stopped briefly at Twin Peaks and Robert Rio roads in Poway about 2:15 p.m. Two guardsmen hopped out and took positions on either side of Robert Rio, decked out in camouflage and holding M-16s.

The Jeeps rumbled on north up Twin Peaks Road, and a block away, two more guardsmen jumped out. The troops stopped motorists trying to take side streets. They appeared to ask some people for identification.

-- Robert Lopez

Larry Wright, business office manager at Brighton Place-East nursing home in Spring Valley east of San Diego, was listening to AM radio in the middle of the night, trying to determine if his 50-bed facility was safe. The charge nurse at the home was "getting more and more worried."

With the news that Mount Miguel had caught on fire, Wright decided that he needed to evacuate his 50-bed nursing home.

"It was more precaution than anything," Wright said. "We weren’t really concerned about the fire. We were concerned about the smoke. We have a ton of patients on oxygen."

By about 5 a.m., all of the residents were in a sister facility, Brighton Place-San Diego. "There was no craziness. It actually went much better than you would expect."

Wright said no one called the nursing home to discuss whether to evacuate. Even so, he said, "I really didn’t see the sense of taking any chances. I’d rather make the move even though it's kind of a pain to get our residents to safety and have them not be in any danger than having to get them out very quick when the fire is acting kind of strange."

By 2 p.m., after watching the smoke go away during the day, Wright said, "it looks like it's coming our way now."

-- Charles Ornstein

Two 21-man U.S. Forest Service crews -- the Feather River Hot Shots and the Breckenridge Hot Shots -- sipped boxed Starbucks coffee in the parking lot of Blondie's Grille & Bar in Arrowbear, waiting for water-dropping planes to clear the way for them to hike in and build a containment line with their saws and pulaskis (a combination ax and pick, used to clear brush).

Jason Foreman, lead saw on the Breckenridge Hot Shots, said the clouds of smoke signified "the buildup" and the peak burn period of the day.

-- Maeve Reston in Arrowbear

Eric Wilson, a fire engineer for the Vacaville Fire Department, puffed on the nub of a cigar. His face was smudged with the soot of a fire that had vanquished up to 60 homes in the sprawling High Valley community in Poway.
For 17 years, Wilson has fought fires. Never has he seen winds like this. His strike team had met its match. After the fight, they moved as if punch drunk, physically sapped, waving to a passerby somberly in slow motion.
"There was nothing you could do," Wilson said.
Wilson took stock of the charred remains of a house they could not save. The strike team had arrived from Northern California about 4 a.m. As soon as the sun broke this morning, walls of flames bore down on High Valley.
"It was just flames, man," Wilson said. "The wind was blowing flames from house to house."
The strike team had to use bump-and-run techniques. If a house began to burn, they moved on to the next one -- the one that could still be saved. It was like fire triage.
"You just have to accept the fact that you can't save it all," Wilson said wearily. "We were fighting the wind. I ain't never seen anything like that."
Just then, the radio crackled, and the firefighters jumped to their feet, riding off to another fire front.
-- Robert Lopez in Poway

Fady Najjar, 16, was watering down palm trees in front of his Santiago Canyon Estates house and watching planes drop pink fire retardant on the flaming hillside.

"This morning they said the fires were all over, and 20 minutes later the hill was on fire," Fady said.

Najjar's cousin, Rob Zahr, 36, came out of the house and told him, "Get ready it's getting time to go."

Zahr added, "When they say they don't have enough resources, it doesn't make you feel warm and fuzzy, it doesn't make you feel safe. Why wouldn't they have the resources here?"

-- Jason Song

Residents evacuated Monday night from eastern Chula Vista can return to their homes. The fire danger has eased for Rolling Hills and Bella Lago.
-- Ari Bloomekatz

Four San Diego County refugees have died in the last two days, including two who were being moved from medical facilities, a county medical examiner official said.

Donald Swarting, 92, was being prepared for evacuation overnight from Mount Miguel Covenant Village Health Facility in Spring Valley when he complained of shortness of breath and chest pain, said Rick Poggemeyer, operations administrator for the medical examiner's office. Swarting was helped to the bathroom and became unresponsive. He was pronounced dead at 4:50 a.m.

On Monday, 91-year-old Alla Robinson stopped breathing en route to Tri-City Medical Center in Oceanside, which was accepting people evacuated from Fallbrook Hospital. She was pronounced dead at 3:30 p.m.

Separately, Poggemeyer said, a 62-year-old woman who had been evacuated from her Rancho Bernardo home died Monday night of head trauma after falling down and hitting her head. Suzanne Casey had initially gone to Qualcomm Stadium, then to a hotel in Pacific Beach. The fall happened as she was leaving a restaurant next to the hotel.

And 95-year-old June Brewer was found dead around 7:20 a.m. in a hotel in Old Town San Diego. She had been evacuated Monday from her Rancho Bernardo home.

-- Charles Ornstein

In the community of High Valley, nestled against the hills on the northeastern edge of Poway, Mike Perry, 46, and four neighbors stood amid charred ruins, using industrial water hoses to douse hot spots left by a fire that had ripped through moments earlier.
Firefighters said up to 60 homes were destroyed, as fire hopscotched from multimillion-dollar home to multimillion-dollar home, leaving some untouched, gutting others.
"It was hot. If we didn't have the big hose, we couldn't have done it," Perry said as his neighbors trained the hose on a smoldering pile of what had been a home that could not be saved.
After the cataclysmic Cedar fire of 2003, neighbors bought the 2-inch-diameter hoses, as well as wrenches to remove fire hydrant caps. That fire feinted at High Valley, then veered away.
This time, the neighborhood wasn't so lucky, although Perry and his friends, armed with their hoses, were able to save an evacuated neighbor's two-story white concrete house. Fire engines at the time were hours away.
"They lost the garage," an exhausted Perry said. "But we saved the house."
He said it was not time to celebrate, though. So many homes were lost. And the fire, which had momentarily turned its back on High Valley, could always come barreling back.
"That's what we're worried about," Perry said.

-- Robert Lopez

At the incident command post by Malibu Civic Center, Los Angeles County Fire Inspector Edward Osorio said about 200 firefighters were leaving the Canyon fire, with some heading to San Diego. The 4,400-acre blaze was burning up to Piuma Road through Carbon Canyon Bowl, steep territory that is unsafe for firefighters.

"We can't get in there in a canyon. We'd have to hike down, and you're basically sending firefighters on a suicide mission," Osorio said.

A plane is dropping fire retardant on the eastern fire line, from Rambla Pacifico to Las Flores Canyon Road, he said.

"The fire's actually laid down pretty good," Osorio said. "There is no active fire activity. Some hot spots are smoking."

The western fire line is along Winter Canyon Road, and the northern line is at Piuma Road, Osorio said.

Some 700 homes have been evacuated of 2,100 people, Osorio said. The fire's cause is under investigation, Osorio said.

-- Tami Abdollah

Modjeska Canyon:

Sobbing as she surveyed the remains of her burned-out Modjeska Canyon home, Sue Geraci was grabbed by friends who kept her from collapsing.

"We have a pump house and water tank," she said. "Our house was supposed to be fire-proof."

Geraci and Brian Joley moved into the multimillion-dollar house about five years ago. Orange County Fire Authority Capt. Keith Davis from San Clemente said that a neighbor's pine trees exploded "like a roman candle" today, sending burning embers across the roof to the attic, and from there, "it just got the house."

On Monday night the home was probably defensible, but firefighters were overwhelmed by the high temperatures and winds that swept through Modjeska Canyon. Some hadn't slept in two days. One 21-member strike team was on a bus waiting for a relief crew to arrive so they could get some rest.

Team leader John McMasters said homeowners didn't help matters by refusing to evacuate.

"Residents were evacuated by sheriffs, and we had to stop what we were doing to let the sheriff's deputies escort them out," McMasters said.

Bruce McDougal, 54, a homebuilder, had spent three months clearing brush and trees to meet an insurance company deadline to set up a 100-foot clearance around his house.

McDougal, who built his Santiago Canyon house, refused to leave it because "it took a long time to build it."

Early today, McMasters' strike team arrived and told McDougal his house would be next to burn if he didn't get his eucalyptus trees down.

"I said I've got two chain saws down in my garage, have at it," McDougal said.

Just down the road, Allen Aksu, McDougal's neighbor, said he wanted to see the fire being fought with more water-carrying helicopters and big tankers.

Aksu thanked animal control officers who took dozens of rabbits and chickens from his ranch to a shelter.

-- David Reyes and Karen Tapia

Malibu:

Caltrans has closed Pacific Coast Highway in both directions between Topanga Canyon
Boulevard and Kanan Dume Road, and Topanga Canyon Boulevard from Pacific Coast Highway to Mulholland
Drive.

As fire raged along Modjeska Canyon Road in Orange County's canyons, Jim Ducote pumped water from his 40,000-gallon swimming pool. He planned to use the water to spray down his roof and yard.

"If it gets too close, we're out of here," said Ducote, 41, chief financial officer for a construction company and resident of Santiago Canyon Estates.

As he spoke, a plane dropped pink fire retardant on a ridge above his house. The housing tract, much newer than the rustic cabins that dotted the canyons, sits in a horseshoe-shaped canyon.

Ducote, whose wife and three sons had evacuated to nearby Santa Margarita, said he had been keeping an eye on the approaching fire for three days. Nearby, on Santiago Canyon Road, the vegetation has burned away and a fire-gutted car sits abandoned.

He said panic had not set in yet. Eyeing his pool, he said, "We'll empty it if we have to."

Like other residents of the area, Ducote said he preferred canyon life despite the risks:

"I always dreaded it," he said of the prospects of fires. "But, no, I'd never move, because I love these canyons. "

-- Jason Song

Rod Percival, 46, coasted his mountain bike down Las Flores Canyon Road, his dog Ayla skittering behind him. Like many residents, Percival and his wife had refused to go. Late Tuesday morning, he used his trusty bike to patrol the canyon and take stock, as best as he could, of the fire danger.

A neighbor, Bruce Bolander, 43, asked Percival how things looked.

"We're safe. I've just ridden around the entire canyon," Percival responded. "The fire's out."

Four San Diego County evacuees have died in the last two days, two in the process of being moved from medical facilities, a county medical examiner official said.

Donald Swarting, 92, was being prepared for evacuation overnight from Mount Miguel Covenant Village Health Facility in Spring Valley when he complained of shortness of breath and chest pain, said Rick Poggemeyer, operations administrator for the medical examiner's office. Swarting was helped to the bathroom and became unresponsive. He was pronounced dead at 4:50 a.m.

It was not Dennis Gulyas' first fire. So when his brother called at 4 a.m. Monday with the news that the Witch fire was heading toward Rancho Penasquitos, he rolled over and went back to sleep.

His family was not bowed by the devastating Cedar fire in 2003. Why should he worry about a fire that was burning farther east? he wondered.

By 6 a.m., with Gulyas still in bed, his wife, Rosa, daughter Kimberly and son Dennis Jr. began packing valuables, their five cats and dog inside a car.

"I grew up in San Diego. I'm used to fires," Gulyas said. "I figured I'll get up later and water down the roof."

His family left for Qualcomm Stadium, arriving at 8:30 a.m.

By 11 a.m., Gulyas was on top of his house, hosing the roof.

"I noticed there was nobody in the neighborhood. There was a lot of ash and smoke but no flames," he said. "A cop drove up and told me to leave."

On Tuesday, the Gulyas family was camped out under the shade of a pine tree in the stadium parking lot. An inflated mattress lying on the sidewalk served as Dennis' bed. His wife and daughter slept inside a tent. Dennis Jr. and a friend slept in another. All of that was donated by local merchants.

"We're all getting back to the basics, even Buddy, our dog," Gulyas said. "He uses our cat litter box. This morning he had to do his business on the ground like a normal dog."

Gulyas said he was a Red Cross volunteer after the 1994 Northridge earthquake.

"The relief effort is much more orderly here," he said. "People aren't pushing, yelling and fighting like they were in L.A."

-- H.G. Reza

Two fires have erupted on Camp Pendleton in northern San Diego County, officials said.

One has forced evacuation of Marines from the 1st Marine Regiment to a safer spot on the sprawling base. So far, no housing units are in immediate danger, although residents of several areas have been on standby since Monday for possible evacuation if the Rice fire burning in Fallbrook pushed onto the base.

-- Tony Perry

Scott Garrett, 48, a semiretired movie studio art department technician, lives in a four-story 6,000-square-foot home on the hillside of Grass Valley on Sonoma Street.

With his Labrador mix, Liberty, he decided to stay through the mandatory evacuations Monday and try to save his home. He was ready to leave "when all the houses started burning and exploding, all the ammunition and propane going off. I saw my neighbor and we decided to stay. I'm glad I did."

"I made a ditch kit: my three favorite paintings, my dog and my favorite pair of shoes [military desert boots]."

A new fire, dubbed the Poomacha fire, erupted about 3 a.m. Tuesday south of Highway 76, burned through the Rincon Indian Reservation and then jumped Interstate 15 westward in the Del Dios area.

By noon it had scorched 23,000 acres and destroyed several buildings and was running parallel to the Rice fire. Firefighters are concerned that the two fires will meet explosively in Del Dios Canyon. Firefighters have been pulled out of the area, and residents are under mandatory evacuation.

Also, the Witch fire is now listed as 200,000 acres and growing.

-- Tony Perry

According to the state Department of Public Health, two hospitals were evacuated Monday in San Diego County: Pomerado Hospital, which has 236 licensed beds and is in Poway, and Fallbrook Hospital, a 140-bed facility in Fallbrook. None have been evacuated today.

Several hospitals, including Scripps Mercy Hospital Chula Vista, have been told today to ready plans for safely transferring patients.

"We have devised an evacuation plan," said Stan Ziano, a spokesman for Scripps Health. "If we need to do that, we can move patients to other Scripps facilities.... We are OK capacity-wise."

The city of Highland is advising residents of a precautionary and voluntary evacuation for those located east of Highway 330, north of Highland Avenue and west of Weaver. The evacuation in the community at the base of the San Bernardino Mountains is due to the Green Valley Lake/Slide Fire.

More than 100 structures were lost in Running Springs as of this morning and 25 in Green Valley Lake, according to U.S. Forest Service spokeswoman Veronica Magnuson. But she said it was difficult to keep track with all the spot fires.

With more than 15,000 people under mandatory evacuation between the Slide and Grass Valley fires, San Bernardino County sheriff's officials were making another round of door-to-door pleas for residents to leave.

"I have a message for them: Please leave," Magnuson said. "You're interfering. You're risking our lives."

Authorities called for a mandatory evacuation of the San Miguel Ranch and Rolling Hills Ranch communities in northern Chula Vista shortly before 11 a.m.

At 11:23 a.m., Capt. Rubin Hernandez of the California Department of Forestry said the fire was burning north of the San Miguel Mountains and south of Highway 94. He said the fire had come dangerously close to Rolling Hills Ranch and the Salt Creek community, threatening about 2,000 homes.

But firefighters made a big push to protect the structures.

At 11:58 a.m., two water-dropping helicopters pounded the flames near Salt Creek, said Deputy Fire Chief Jim S. Gerring of the Chula Vista Fire Department.

"We knocked the fire back into itself and stopped its forward progress," he said.

Still, the speed and direction of the winds were changing so much, officials said, that it was hard to know where the fire was going to go next. Within half an hour, the winds had increased from 10 to 15 mph to 20 to 25 mph and shifted from an easterly direction to westerly and back and forth.

The winds are "very unpredictable," Gerring said, noting that he had never seen such conditions.

But while the evacuation order remains in effect, he said, "this area is much safer than it was an hour ago."

-- Ari Bloomekatz

Riverside County Fire spokesperson Massiel Ladron De Guevara said that by 12:25 p.m. the so-called Rosa Fire had burned 411 acres -- mostly of heavy vegetation -- west of Interstate 15.

About 200 firefighters are battling the blaze and had it 50% contained, with full containment expected sometime Wednesday. She said a voluntary evacuation was in effect in De Luz, an unincorportated area of the county.

-- Christopher Goffard

By 10:30 a.m. the mountain communities of Running Springs and Green Valley had lost a combined 100 houses at least. At the hour, however, it appeared that the fire had skirted the rustic downtown of Running Springs, U.S. Forest Service spokesman Bob Poole said. But homes outside the town center continued to catch fire.

Along with the usual signs of devastation -- lone chimneys and blackened rubble -- were some incongruous scenes. At three houses burned to the ground, pipes from the household plumbing survived and the water still flowed, creating mini-geysers that tossed water up about eight inches even as the scene smoldered.

The heat rising off the houses created optical illusions as well, like a wobbly, waving highway in a desert. Blacked trees viewed through the heat appeared to shimmer.

On one block, six vehicles -- two pickups, three sedans and a van -- were parked facing nose-out at the ends of driveways, ready to escape. The residents of the houses were nowhere to be found, but the six vehicles, now burned hulks, sat in their driveways.

-- Louis Sahagun

At 10 a.m., fire refugees from as far away as Lake Arrowhead and as close as La Costa had filled up a gymnasium at Carlsbad High, about 10 miles from the nearest blaze.

Sleeping bags, air mattresses, cots and pet carriers were spread all over the hardwood, and a long table packed with doughnuts, bagels, cookies and juices was jammed against the bleachers.

The newest arrivals were the Zehners from Solana Beach, evacuated from their house west of Interstate 5 and a mile from the beach at 7:30 a.m.

"I think they're being conservative," Ken Zehner said. "They feel like they can do a better job with people out of there. And I guess there's a certain logic to that."

Ken lives in a six-bedroom house with his wife, daughter, two grandchildren and two dogs. Zehner is confident his house will be standing when he returns home.

"I can't imagine the fire department not being able to stop the fire from crossing Interstate 5," he said.

So far, Zehner likes the accommodations.

"Boy, that orange juice hits the spot," he said. "Outstanding."

At 10:15 a.m., Rachel Bender of Poway learned that her house was still standing. But she refrained from celebrating.

"It's a relief, but there's not much joy in it," she said. "My parents have lost their home in Rancho Bernardo, and I'm sure a lot of other people around me are hurting too."

At 10:30 a.m., Carlsbad school officials announced that the second gym will be a "quiet, pet-free zone."

"We learned a few things from last night," said Al Cabacungan, who is organizing the volunteer effort. "The noise of the pets kept people awake."

-- Dave McKibben

In the nicer parts of San Clemente, "no vacancy" signs adorned ocean-view resort hotels, one after another, and a San Diego crowd had transformed the normally sleepy weekday beach town into a bustling carnival.

Every table at the waterfront cafes was filled, and evacuees with dogs, trailers and cars stuffed with household possessions could be seen on every block.

"They have been coming in since yesterday," said Cindy Campbell, manager at the posh San Clemente Cove Resort Condominiums, a time-share condominium complex overlooking to ocean where units typically rent for $225 a night.

Evacuees got a break, paying only $200 per night, and were allowed to bring their pets, she said. Many were from the Carlsbad area, she said.

Dave Henderson, 43, a computer director, spent the night at the San Clemente Cove with his wife and 13-month-old daughter after evacuating the Del Mar area ahead of the order so that the baby would not have to breathe smoky air.

The family could book the condo for only one night, and Henderson was returning the garage-door opener at the front desk, baby in one arm, so the family could head north to Laguna Beach, where another hotel room waited.

"It could be a lot worse," he said as waves crashed at the nearby pier and people passed with surfboards.

Henderson said hotel clerks were helping evacuees by providing referrals, so he had to make only a few calls to find the condo.

"The thing I learned is: leave early! It's less stress," he said. "You don't think it is going to reach you, so you want to stay. But live and learn."

--Jill Leovy

Jerry Sanders was a police officer for 25 years before he became mayor of San Diego, and sometimes he reverts to old ways.

At a press conference at Qualcomm Stadium, where 10,000 evacuees from the county's fires have taken refuge, Sanders was reading to reporters a list of companies that have come forward to offer goods and services.

He stopped at one name and called it "my personal favorite": Krispy Kreme, the doughnut makers.

"I'm a cop, what am I supposed to say?" Sanders joked.

It was the first laugh for the mayor or his audience in a couple of days.

-- Tony Perry in San Diego

The ridges above Modjeska Canyon are completely engulfed in 50 to 75 feet high flames, and firefighters were unable to battle them. The canyon was too narrow and the heat and flames too intense to try to save 330 homes in the canyon. It was not immediately clear how many were burned.

Nearly all the residents evacuated early today, and the few who were left fled at about 10:45 this morning.

Resident Mark Jackson ran up to fire fighters and said, "The fire is right on my house. This is really scary. I lived through eight fires out here, and I've never seen anything like this. Why can't you do anything?"

John Kinsman, who was fleeing the canyon with his three dogs and one cat said, "The fire was eating up my house right now!"

No firefighters were available to help put out the flames.

-- Janet Wilson in Modjeska Canyon

High above, water-dropping airplanes circled as fires raced up Mt. Woodson near Poway. Down below, in the Mina de Oro community of hilltop homes, firefighters tried to beat back flames that flanked two-thirds of the neighborhood.
Dave Alfer, 47, had no real business here. On Sunday night, his 3,500-square-home in Ramona had burned to the ground. He could have evacuated and started to reflect long and hard about rebuilding among other fire refugees.
Instead, he came to this fire-ringed community to help a friend in need and whoever else he could. Looking tired and scruffy with a beard, blue jeans, work boots and a baseball cap, Alfer lugged around a cooler with Gatorade. The auto repair shop owner passed the sports drinks out to weary firefighters and residents. He used his Jeep Cherokee to help neighbors move belongings to safety.
"I haven't slept in three days," Alfer said Tuesday. "I'm driving around from house to house, trying to help out. That's just the way my daddy brought me up."
About 11:20 a.m., as aircraft attacked the flames on the mountain crowned with communication towers, Alfer loaded his friend's goat into his Jeep and drove off, taking the animal to safety -- all the while flashing the peace sign.

-Robert J. Lopez in Mina de Oro (near Poway)

The Santiago fire has ravaged 17,800 acres and is moving north toward rural canyons at the edge of Cleveland National Forest. Containment is unchanged at 30%.

Mandatory evacuation orders remain in place at Silverado, Williams and Modjeska canyons, and voluntary evacuations are in effect in the foothill areas of Lake Forest.

Santiago Canyon Road is closed between the 241 toll road and Cooks Corner. Foothill Ranch, Porter Hills and Silverado elementary schools are closed, as are all schools in Laguna Beach.

--Seema Mehta

The air was thick with smoke and ash at the Running Springs fire
station, where strike teams from all over California gathered to fight
the Slide fire, which encircled the community of Green Valley Lake and
the northwest region of Running Springs down to Fredalba.

U.S. Forest Service Battalion Chief Steve R. Seltzner, who had been on duty for
more than 30 hours by this morning, said the fire was continuing to
burn west, southwest and south toward Highland and
San Bernardino.

To the dismay of firefighters, the blaze jumped to the
south side of Highway 330 – increasing the risk to communities
to the south.

"It's four to five miles north of Highland, but with the wind
conditions and rapid rate of spread, it can travel that distance in a
matter of an hour or less," Seltzner said just before 10 a.m. today.

-- Maeve Reston in Running Springs