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Fires Rage, Thousands Evacuate in Southern California; Funding the Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan

Aired October 22, 2007 - 13:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

DON LEMON, CO-HOST: Hello, everyone. I'm Don Lemon live at the CNN world headquarters in Atlanta.
BETTY NGUYEN, CO-HOST: Hello, everybody. I'm Betty Nguyen, in for Kyra Phillips today. You are in the CNN NEWSROOM.

You hear it? Roaring fire, howling winds, the sound, the fury, the flames. Wild fires burning out of control all night and all day in Southern California.

LEMON: Yes, it's just amazing there. We're expecting a news conference in a few minutes from California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. But we know this. It's worse than firefighters ever imagined and getting worse by the hour. Malibu is burning.

Thousands in the San Diego area are fleeing, including hospital patients and nursing home residents. And the flames, they are surging forward, backed by hurricane-force winds.

Through it all you shared -- you shared your breath-taking eye reports with us. Well, we'll show you much, much more and take you live right into the flames.

First, we want to get started with the Witch fire, and it's wicked. Tens of thousands of people near San Diego have already fled the flames. More could follow.

Let's start the coverage now in San Diego County, California, with CNN's Kara Finnstrom -- Kara.

KARA FINNSTROM, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, hello. We actually just moved, because this fire is spreading so quickly that the area we were reporting from earlier this morning, the fire had completely moved through, just torching that earth.

And this is what we saw as we drove about 20 minutes across San Diego: just these masses of black smoke everywhere. And this is part of the real danger that fire officials are talking about right now, because if we zoom into some areas, you can see flames just shooting up from the midst of this black smoke. And in some cases you can't see more than 50 feet in front of you, so you are literally on top of these flames before you see them.

So classes at the University of San Diego and UCSC have been both canceled because of these dangerous conditions for dealing about here... LEMON: Kara -- Kara, sorry, we're going to have to interrupt you. We're going to go live to a news conference on San Diego with the mayor there. We'll get back with you. Thank you.

Let's take a listen in.

MAYOR JERRY SANDERS, SAN DIEGO: ... so that people will be out of that area by the time -- time the fire comes through. And as you have seen, we have fires all over the county of San Diego, and we have fires in heavily populated areas.

Right now there's a mandatory city evacuation on the north side from Del Dios; on the west side, Interstate 5; and on the south boundary, it's Highway 56.

The fire right now -- the Witch fire is the one I'm talking about -- is going in a northwest direction. It's moving very quickly. We're losing homes along that. For those that evacuate, Qualcomm Stadium is available with city staff there to help you out.

I just want to say also we've received offers of assistance from the White House, from our senators, from the governor, who will be visiting today in just a few moments. And we're receiving those as we move forward.

Right now every asset the city of San Diego has and, indeed, the county is being used on this fire. So, from the city perspective we do not have damage estimates; we don't know the number of structures; and we don't know the injuries. And we probably won't for some time, because we can't fight the fire and get back into some of the structures that are still burning.

We're asking people to stay off the roads, to stay at home. If you're in an area that could be affected, please pack your car. Be ready to evacuate on a moment's notice. If you're nervous at all, please evacuate and go to one of the evacuation centers.

And finally, if you could minimize cell phone usage, that would be extremely helpful to our emergency personnel. They're using cell phones as one of the primary means of communication. If the cell sites load up, that means they don't have that ability to do that.

So that's it from the city of San Diego.

Thank you, Mayor Sanders.

LEMON: All right. That's the mayor of San Diego there. I'm just writing some of the information that he said that I found was very important. He said -- he's asking people there in the area, residents and also people who may be visiting, to limit the use of cell phones, because they're using those cell phones; emergency responders on the scene using cell phones to talk back and forth and also to relay emergency information to other people who may be helping out.

So again, he says they're using all their resources there. Still don't know the full extent of the damage. We're going to continue to follow this story, and we have more on it now -- Betty.

NGUYEN: Absolutely. From the high desert to the ocean Pacific, much of Southern California is just under siege. Meteorologist Chad Myers is keeping track of the fires and the winds and joins us from the CNN weather center with the latest on that.

I know you've been looking at it all morning long. What do you have now?

CHAD MYERS, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Well, it's been gusty. And you never really know when that next gust is coming. I mean, we saw Kara out there, and the winds were blowing across so you could barely see her face.

Literally -- and this is what's going on. The winds are just coming out of the east and the northeast. Sometimes they're 7, and then, literally 10 minutes later, they're 25 gusting to 35. And that's when it gets dangerous, because the firefighters think they're doing the right thing and they moved in. And then all of a sudden they can be inundated with all that extra oxygen that the winds blow in.

Most of the fires that we've been talking about have been north of here, north of San Diego, up toward Malibu. But the area, San Diego County really, he talked about how many fires there are and how many fires there are in residential areas. This area has been hit very, very hard.

Let's move our attention a little bit farther to the north, on up toward Malibu, on to where we showed you the pictures yesterday, around Pepperdine and just to the west of Los Angeles.

See how Malibu -- actually, the coast of California is actually east-west here for just a little bit before it turns back up to the north. Well, here's Malibu, the church you saw that was on fire, the big castle that was on fire. The fire started in the mountains because of a downed power line, they think, and then it actually crashed all the way down toward the ocean.

Now, many of these fires were sparked as sparks flew over the top of ridges, and those sparks went a half a mile or more. Look at these winds here. Ontario, that's a sustained wind of 33 miles per hour. There's Palmdale at 24. L.A., OK, a little less at 7. But get back up here, 38. It's desert air coming crashing down the mountains, the winds here picking up the embers and the embers flying a mile or a mile and a half downwind.

We're going to see that all day, and the winds are going to pick up this afternoon. I'll explain what this map is behind me, how the winds come up the hill and then sparks fly, and they fly for miles -- Betty.

NGUYEN: Well, you know, that really puts it in perspective, because you're talking about a little ember that is flying over a ridge that would go more than a mile? MYERS: Right. And all of a sudden -- I mean, this entire area didn't even burn. The burn area was to the west of where all of this and to the north of where all of these extra fires began to burn down toward Pepperdine and down in the valleys and that church and that castle that burned were embers that were a mile away from the main fire.

And so that's what the firefighters have to work with. They think they're fighting the main fire.

NGUYEN: Right.

MYERS: And then all of a sudden they have a fire in a residential area because the sparks flew from downwind.

NGUYEN: Goodness. They do have a lot on their hands today.

Thanks for pointing that out and helping us understand how this thing is moving so quickly. Appreciate it, Chad.

LEMON: Yes, Betty.

And you guys absolutely do have a lot on your hands. We want to talk about that now with someone who can answer some questions. Specifically, Malibu city hall is now command center for firefighters, and joining us now is Michael Jarvis. He's with the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.

You are in the command center. You hear us here talking about all this. You heard Chad talking about the embers and everything. So you've got Los Angeles County, San Diego County. Tell us -- give us the very latest.

MICHAEL JARVIS, CALIFORNIA DEPARTMENT OF FORESTRY: Well, we've actually had a couple of fires actually crop up in San Diego County, and we've also had a couple more in San Bernardino, so it seems like they get a couple under control and then another one is popping up.

And someone was talking about embers on there. I've got to apologize. It's pretty windy here in Malibu, but the -- the embers are actually really kind of kick-starting a lot of these problems that we're having.

And even here in Malibu, I mean, we're watching on the back of this canyon, that you can just see it moving along.

So, what we're just trying to do is put people in the right spot. We've got a lot of equipment and a lot of personnel. And we're having a little bit of trouble with the winds, because the aircraft has not got as much flexibility as it normally would. So, there's a lot of swirling winds going on around here, and that's -- that's hampering some of the effort.

LEMON: Absolutely, Mr. Jarvis. I'm want to give my meteorologist, Chad Myers -- I don't know if he's around, but if he has any questions for you, he can feel free to jump in, because he mentioned those embers, as well.

You guys are up against a really, really devastating situation there. How are you seeing all this working -- working through all of this?

JARVIS: Well, California's got a very extensive system of mutual aid. And we cooperate with all the different entities and agencies here, federal, state and local.

So we've got everybody throwing all types of resources at these fires down here, including most of our resources for Cal Fire out of the north. We moved them down last week in anticipation of this weather incident. And that was more engines, more tankers and personnel.

So we knew, once the red flag was coming to Santa Anas to pre- position equipment and personnel down here. What we're trying right do is try to figure out where to put everybody, because what's happening is that a lot of these fires are just shifting. And once you get one side fixed you got to go to the other.

But the other thing that's going on right now is we're just trying to figure out the best way that we can utilize the resources we have. Like I'm looking at one of our helicopters here that's using a bandy (ph) bucket to pick up some water, and it's going and making drops.

But the helicopters were a little late getting going this morning, just because of the wind. It's just...

LEMON: Yes.

JARVIS: ... it's really a swirly, squirrelly winds is what someone calls them. But we're just hoping that, if we can keep stuff at least isolated and a little bit contained the next day or two, things might look better on Wednesday. We can start making some catches (ph).

LEMON: OK. And Mr. Jarvis, we really appreciate -- appreciate you joining us. Thank you so much.

Listen, now, we may have you back because Chad Myers is standing by, and he's got some questions for us. But we've got to move on, because we have to take a break.

Listen, we wish you the best of luck. Any new information comes out of this, please give us a shout back and update us here in the CNN NEWSROOM.

JARVIS: Thank you so much.

LEMON: Best of luck.

NGUYEN: And within just a couple minutes now, we're going to be hearing from Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. A news conference is going to take place around 1:15 Eastern today, dealing with the fires, not only the canyon fire but the other fires that are running near the Los Angeles area.

Looking at some live pictures right now, out of Malibu. Just look at this. The smoke, the flames. So far in Malibu alone just to give you some perspective on how big this thing is, 20,000 acres burned, and at least two landmarks have also been burned to the ground because of this fire that is moving so quickly, thanks to the Santa Ana winds.

And so of course, we're going to stay on top of this and bring you that news conference from the governor just as soon as it takes place.

Well, if you'd like to watch continuing coverage of the wild fires ravaging California, just check out our online network: CNN.com/live. You can also send us an I-Report. Or see some we've already received, again. But CNN.com.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: Burning out of control all night and all day. Our top story happening right now. It's in Southern California, where hurricane force winds are fanning at least a dozen wild fires.

Thousands have fled their homes, along with a hospital and nursing homes near San Diego. And to the north, in Malibu, not even a fortress-like castle could withstand the flames.

Firefighters say the blazes are worse than they imagined and getting more dangerous by the hour. The skies are blood red, and the smoke can be seen for miles. At least one person has been killed, at least 20 others hurt.

NGUYEN: Let's take you live to Malibu now and the old Malibu station, where we understand the governor is speaking right now about the fires. Take a listen.

GOV. ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER (R), CALIFORNIA: ... leading the briefing. I want to thank also Sheriff Baca, Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky, Chief Freeman, Chief Tripp (ph), Chief Sedaris (ph) and Mayor Ulich from Malibu for being part of this briefing and keeping us up to date. I want to thank all of you.

It's a tragic time for California. The devastating fires have killed so far one person; they've injured four firefighters. Maria and I want to join all Californians, to send our thoughts and prayers to the families of those victims.

Our brave state, local and federal firefighters have been battling the blaze for the last 48 hours, and they've done an extraordinary job, 24 hours around the clock. And it's really spectacular to see those firefighters, the great dedication. We want to thank them all. These are the best trained, the best equipped, the most experienced firefighters in the world.

Now all across Southern California we have seven counties with fires so far. Tens of thousands of acres have burned. Thousands of buildings have been threatened. We have been evacuating residents in harm's way. And extremely dangerous heavy winds and dry conditions make it very, very hard to get these fires under control.

We're getting continual updates and doing all we can to protect the lives and also the property. I proclaimed a state of emergency in seven counties, and Cal Fire officials are using what resources they need in order to put out those fires.

I urge everyone to follow the directions and evacuation orders issued by the emergency personnel.

Now here, this fire, the Canyon fire, there are so far 2,400 acres that have burned, and 10 percent of the fires are under control and contained. Hundreds of people have been evacuated under mandatory -- mandatory, precautionary and voluntary evacuation.

Eight buildings so far have been destroyed: five homes, two commercial structures and one church. Several roads have been closed. (AUDIO GAP)

... thank everyone for taking action to keep the campus community safe. So again, I want to thank everyone for their great, great efforts. And I would like to bring out now Yev Yaroslavsky to say a few words.

ZEV YAROSLAVSKY, SUPERVISOR: Thank you very much, Governor.

NGUYEN: All right. We've been listening to Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, talking about how this fast-moving fire is just tearing through many parts of California.

If you're looking at these live pictures right now of Malibu, they're still trying to keep the flames at bay. But the smoke is obviously in the air, and the fires are burning very quickly. We'll stay on top of this.

In fact, we're going to continue with Malibu right now, because some 1,400 firefighters are battling a blaze that has burned homes, buildings, even a castle.

CNN's Vince Gonzales is there.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

VINCE GONZALES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Conditions have gotten better, believe it or not, here in Malibu. Officials say the fire is now 10 percent contained, and the governor is coming here to survey the damage. In fact, he's going to be coming to this church, the Presbyterian Church in Malibu, which was a victim of those flying embers from yesterday, when the winds kicked up and embers were thrown far from the main body of the fire.

They hit this church, and firefighters tell us they didn't have a chance to try and save this structure. By the time they got here, the wind had fanned the flames; it was fully engulfed. The second floor came down. There's really nothing left but a blackened shell. But there is some rebuilding going on here. Across the street power crews are trying to get the power lines back up. This is cited as one possible cause of the Malibu fire, is power lines that came down during those high-speed Santa Ana winds.

The problem this has created is emergency management officials can't get the word out to residents that there are evacuations, because they don't have power. They're hearing it on local TV or radio. They're relying on sheriff's deputies, going around the neighborhoods in cars with their loud speakers to tell people it's time to get out.

New communities are under voluntary evacuations in Malibu. And we're told that the winds keep gusting like they are. Those could become mandatory evacuations.

And the fear is that the winds start gusting again, just as they were yesterday, we'll once again have that fire throwing those embers down towards the ocean, setting some of those multi-million-dollar homes on fire. And then the only thing that will stop it will be the Pacific Ocean.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

LEMON: And that was our Vince Gonzales from our affiliate there.

But check this out. We just learned -- this is just into the CNN NEWSROOM. As we look at these live pictures over Malibu, authorities are telling the Associated Press, 250,000 people, Betty, nearly evacuated from their homes in San Diego County. This continues to grow.

We spoke with Mr. Jarvis from the command center just moments ago, maybe about five minutes ago. And he said the embers are making things worse. The winds aren't helping out, either. The fires just keep jumping from one place to the other.

They're trying to figure out where're going to house all these emergency people who are there, how they're going to best get the equipment out to places where they're going.

So this has grown into a much more serious situation now, with nearly 250,000 people being evacuated from their homes, forced from their homes, because of these wild fires. Obviously, this is a big story here today on CNN. So many people are, at this point, without a home.

Those pictures are live pictures, courtesy again of our affiliate, KTLA, coming to you from Malibu, California.

A castle, no less, falls victim to the Malibu wild fire. Details straight ahead in the NEWSROOM.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

LEMON: All right. We're following breaking news here in the CNN NEWSROOM. And there it is right there. You see the fires on both sides of your screen, not only affecting homes but affecting lives.

And just moments ago, we got an urgent from the Associated Press, saying nearly 250,000 people now have been driven from their homes because of evacuations because of these fires.

The governor held a press conference just moments ago. The mayor of San Diego held a press conference, along with the San Diego County board of supervisors, Ron Roberts. And he spoke about these conditions, these dire conditions happening. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

RON ROBERTS, SAN DIEGO COUNTY BOARD OF SUPERVISORS: We have an emergency situation here in San Diego County. We have several fires going. Collectively, they burned over 100,000 acres.

We have now evacuated close to 250,000 people from their homes. This is a major emergency.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

NGUYEN: Earlier we showed you the governor of California speaking. Well, now state officials are also briefing the media on the situation there in California. Let's take a listen.

PAMELA CONLEY ULICH, ACTING MAYOR OF MALIBU: He's been here, his staff has been here from the get-go. And also Lee Baca, the sheriff, you're doing an amazing job.

I wanted to take this opportunity to also thank some local heroes. We have one man; his name is Rafael Lopez (ph). He works at the Shell Station right here. All you guys passed it. He stayed here overnight. He hasn't been home. And I'd like to really thank him for going above and beyond the call of duty to help all of you fight this fire.

I'd also like to thank -- and our condolences go out to the church -- the Malibu Presbyterian Church. Even though Sunday morning people were getting ready to go to church yesterday, after they found out they couldn't get there, it was burned down, a lot of the people from the congregation went to the Pastor Greg Hughes's house. And Kay (ph) was there, his wife, to bring food. They brought water. They wanted to help wherever they could.

And that really kind of capsulizes (sic) the spirit, I think, of the people here in the great state of California. We're here to help each other. Homes can be replaced; people can't.

The message today is be prepared. The winds are changing as we speak. A lot of people don't have -- in the west side of town don't have electricity. They don't have their cable. They don't know what's going on. My message to them is you can get to Malibu High School. It is now an evacuation center. So you can go there. You can get information. Be prepared, be safe. The schools are closed.

It's a horrible day, but it's also a beautiful day because you get to spend time with your family where you may not have usually -- so kind of live in the moment. We're blessed to be alive. We're blessed to be here.

And I'd like to thank the media for helping us communicate with our neighbors.

And I'm going to turn it over to Chief Freeman, another wonderful hero. Thank you, Chief Freeman.

CHIEF P. MICHAEL FREEMAN, LOS ANGELES COUNTY FIRE DEPARTMENT: Thank you very much. I'll be very brief.

On behalf of all of the firefighters, the men and women, our colleagues in law enforcement, all of the support personnel, we want to thank you, thank the public for your cooperation and your understanding.

Without a fire, this would be considered a wind storm. When we put the fire into the mix, it is a fire storm. And that is exactly what the firefighters and all of our cooperating agencies are facing.

So, we want to continue to stress the importance of public cooperation. We want to really emphasize that, if you are advised to evacuate, please cooperate and do that. That makes the job of fire fighting much safer for the firefighters, and I assure you they will do everything that is humanly possible to save your property.

What you see here this morning, we're very appreciative, obviously, for the governor coming here, our supervisor, our mayor, and our assembly member. This is government at its best. It's a cooperative effort from the state right down through local government. And I can assure you from the fire fighting perspective, we could not do this alone. So, this team effort is very important.

We thank you, Governor. We thank all of you for your support.

SCHWARZENEGGER: Thank you very much. Thank you. Anyone else? Assemblywoman Julia Brownley, please come out here. Thank you for being here.

JULIE BROWNLEY, ASSEMBLYWOMAN: I want to say a word or two. I wanted to thank the governor for his leadership. There is, on behalf of the residents and citizens that I represent, not only here in Malibu and Ventura County and throughout the state.

I want to be clear that we have a very united force here. As the governor said, we have the very best firefighters in the country. We are doing everything that is humanly possible.

What we need now is for Mother Nature to change her course, to take the role of a more motherly approach, and the combination of the weather changing its course and with the united force here, I know we will get these fires contained and people back safely to their homes. Thank you very much.

SCHWARZENEGGER: Thank you very much. Thank you very much. If you have any questions, please.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (UNINTELLIGIBLE)

SCHWARZENEGGER: Well, I think that the reason why I didn't declare a state of emergency immediately so the resources are available because I think that the only way this works is if the state and if the locals, if law enforcement, fire officials, firefighter firefighters, local, state and federal, everyone, the OAS, everyone works together as quickly as possible. We wanted to make the resources available and it's up to the fire chiefs and everyone to make this kind of decision of what they need. And I think that one of the things that was very clear in the briefings that I've gotten was we have learned a lot in the last four years since the last -- the fires that we had in 2003. One of the things that you see now is it's much more equipment available, more man power is available. Everyone is coordinating much faster.

And again, I also want to thank not only the firefighters that have done an extraordinary job in the last 24 hours but also law enforcement, all law enforcement officials have worked so efficiently and coordinated so well in order to create quick and efficient action.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What did you see out there?

SCHWARZENEGGER: I haven't yet -- the next thing I'm going to do is look at the buildings and the structures to see what the damage is. What I have seen so far, any time you have a home burn down or some commercial structure or a church of course it's really bad. And we have to do everything we can to help these people to get back on their feet as quickly as possible. I think that's why we all are here today so we can work together and provide as much help as possible. First we have to just pray that the wind slows down. Because the wind is our number one enemy now and the dry weather so we hope that these weather conditions change as quickly as possible.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The fire departments around the state in the situation -- are there no more resources?

SCHWARZENEGGER: I think we can have the fire chief here address that. But one of the things that I've learned and the briefing was that they are very efficient in reaching out to other states because we have an agreement with other states. Where if we fall short, because California doesn't always get one fire. We have like at one point I remember it was 26 fires all over California. Now we have seven fires all over California. And there are others starting in northern California. So, there's all kinds of things that happen because it's dry all over California. The wind all over, so the conditions are really terrible. So we can reach out to other states and get help. But maybe you can address some of the questions.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I would tell you that there were not a maximum draw-down but it's getting tight. Resources from the north part of the state are being brought to southern part of the state, but it is getting tight. We have already gone to Nevada and we were looking to go to Arizona for aviation assets as well. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How much could you get from the two other states?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, right now we're trying to go the close available states. During 2003 both Nevada and Arizona provided us 50 engines, then we went to Oregon. We've got to Nevada, working through going to Arizona but we're only into -- only about a little more than 24 hours in from where we started yesterday. And we still haven't drawn all of the resources in the north part down. So we'll continue to work on that. The fire agencies, both paid and volunteer, will continue to canvas resources and make resources available to continue the flow of those assets down there. I'm the state fire and rescue chief for emergency services.

F: You have been listening to officials in California talking about how grave the situation is with the fires. To give you an indication, the governor has declared a state of emergency. He says the wind and the dry weather is the number one enemy. To put it ALL in perspective, fires burned about 100,000 acres in San Diego County. Now just listen to this from the San Diego fire captain, she says quote we have more houses burning than we have people in engine companies to fight them. She goes on to say a lot of people are going to lose their homes.

DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: You heard the governor saying it was an emergency situation, what he called it. A dire situation and saying they are leeching out to other states for help in this. And now the fires are starting in northern California. He mentioned Lake Tahoe. And he's saying it's because --

BETTY NGUYEN, CNN ANCHOR: Of the wind.

LEMON: They are so dry. And because of those winds. We mentioned to you about 250,000 people driven from their homes because of evacuation order. Some of those people who have been hurt or may have to be treated for smoke inhalation have been going to the hospital. We should say probably hundreds. Let's get check on that. Andy is with a hospital and a spokesperson there. Tell us how many people you have there and tell us what's going on. Who are you seeing being brought in and what are the symptoms?

ANDY HOANG, PALOMAR POMERADO HEALTH: Well, Don, we're looking to evacuate. We're discharging 77 patients, and additional 121 patients over at our skilled nursing facility. The skilled nursing is located on the same campus as the hospital. We received a call around 8:00 this morning from the county alerting us that local residents around the surrounding areas, and other senior type retirement homes have been given the notice to evacuate. That was about 1,000 people in the surrounding area to evacuate. We took it upon ourselves to go ahead and start beginning the evacuation or discharging process of our patients to ensure that we could get them out safely at this time. Because there really is no guarantee if we wait longer not knowing which way the wind would blow and take the fire, especially if the fires were head to our facility.

LEMON: OK. Let me get this straight. So people are being evacuated and they're waited coming into the hospital. Are you telling me now that you're evacuating the hospital? Is that what you're saying?

HOANG: Yes. We are in the process of evacuating and discharging our patients here. In total, we're looking to move 77 patients, then additional 121 over at the skilled nursing facility.

LEMON: Got it. I'm thinking people are coming into your hospital for injury, which I would imagine they are or were, but now the hospital is being evacuated. And then you've also got, what kind of position does this put the people there who are in the health care industry? Hospitals and what have you because you're moving people out of nursing homes. You're moving patients from other hospitals to other places. I'm not sure if people can get sort of the impact of this. Explain that to us a little bit Mr. Hoang.

HOANG: It's a tremendous impact here, but fortunately the process has gone quite smoothly. This is something we prepare for. We hold several emergency type drills like this throughout the year. Right now we have several school buses outside in front of the hospital waiting to move our patients. For the patients that are in critical condition we're still waiting for ambulances to come out here, for critical transport because when a patient is in critical condition, we need that type of critical care transportation. That's the only thing we're waiting on right now is for the answers to arrive so we can transport the critical care patients to other facilities.

LEMON: You said you're there on the campus, right in the thick of it?

HOANG: Yes. We have a central command set up. We're compiling our list of patients and trying to notify family. Letting them know which facilities their loved ones will be transported to.

LEMON: Wow. Just unbelievable situation there. Listen. We understand that you have serious business to take care of and lots of details to pay attention to today. We certainly thank you for taking time out to on CNN. Andy Hong is the health spokesperson for Palomar Pomerado Hospital there, evacuating the hospital some 121 patients, he hopes to have evacuated and ten also he's got 170 more that have been released. Unbelievable things happening. Betty has more breaking news on this.

NGUYEN: Actually you know we've been talking a lot about these forced evacuations. Some 250,000 people are being told you have to get out and you have to leave now. That number is just so large I don't even know if it's unprecedented but it's a huge number. A quarter million people told to evacuate, force evacuation. This is not voluntary folks. This is force. We're going to speak with an I- reporter coming up right in the NEWSROOM to get an idea of what is going on, on the ground with those evacuations and with the fire that is burning. Stay with CNN.

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NGUYEN: We want to get you back to the witch fire. Some 250,000 people are forced to evacuate the San Diego area. Take you on the ground now and CNN's Kara Finnstrom joins us live. What's the situation where you are, Kara?

KARA FINNSTROM, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, we actually just drove a while ago to get across a good stretch of San Diego county. Everywhere we went San Diego burning, huge amounts of black smoke and this is the real big concern for firefighters and city officials right now. You can't see more than 50 feet ahead of you in some of these areas. And suddenly you'll be upon the fire. There are just pockets of fire everywhere. You see San Diego, you see University of San Diego, both closed, classes at both closed. City officials are asking people not to get on the streets and drive if they don't have to. And literally, what the areas of San Diego we've driven through are a ghost town. We see areas of scorched earth and areas where firefighters are you know, manning and hoping to prevent the fire from burning. We do know that right now there is a hospital and several nursing homes being evacuated because they are in the path of these wildfires. And a little earlier city officials came together and held a press conference to talk about the huge number of people evacuated, 250,000. Here's what they had to say.

RON ROBERTS, CHMN., SAN DIEGO CO. BOARD OF SUPERVISORS: We have an emergency situation here in San Diego County. We have several fires going collectively they burned over 100,000 acres. We have now evacuated close to 250,000 people from their homes. This is a major emergency.

FINNSTROM: And this will give you an idea of kind of the patchwork of torched earth we're seeing. Over on this side you can see that this area has been burnt through. Across the street you can see the fire picked up in a construction area. Then this drug store appears to have been spared at least for now. This is a lot of what we're seeing, just areas where there are you know, it's hit and miss with these fires.

These winds are extremely high, 80 miles per hour. So we're talking about hurricane-force winds. The concern is not only picking up the umbers and spreading them but it's been really hard for firefighters to get up in the air, to make any headway with this fire. The hope is over the next couple days hopefully although the forecast is not for this, that they may be able to find some kind of a place to get in here and make some headway. But the red flag warning is in effect through at least Tuesday.

Back to you.

NGUYEN: But Kara, let me ask you this. Some 250,000 people are being told to evacuate. This is a forced evacuation. Looking at the roadways and you described the situation on the ground, are there clear routes for people to leave their homes?

FINNSTROM: Well, what we heard earlier this morning when those evacuations were first ordered in one part of this county, was that there were tremendous road blocks and people couldn't get out. On local radio we could hear people complaining, you know calling up saying we can't get out, we need deputies to open up the roadways. But I'll tell you when we drove around just about an hour ago, everything was wide open. We didn't see a soul other than fire trucks racing back and forth and police cars. So people are either staying put or they have begun to make their way out.

NGUYEN: These pictures are incredible. Looks like a sea of smoke. Kara Finnstrom, joining us live from San Diego, of course we'll check in with you throughout the day. Thank you.

LEMON: You mentioned pictures, our affiliate pictures always fantastic professionals there on the job shooting these pictures, some of them getting really close to the scene and putting themselves in danger to bring you the pictures. We also get a lot of our pictures from eyes and ears on the ground, our I-reporters, right T.J., spending some time and sending some pictures to us. In the meantime, T.J.'s got some stuff he wants to tell us now about from an I- reporter.

T.J. HOLMES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes. You talk about the professionals we have, but some of the best pictures are from our I- reporters, people on the round. The citizen reporters there on the scene and we can't beat their pictures sometimes. James Fabin brought these to us. I know you're on the phone Wisconsin. Tell us where you were. I hope you can see a TV screen. We are looking at your I- report. Tell us what was going on, what was happening in this scene right here.

JAMES FABIN, I-REPORTER: I was actually on the way to the gym. I saw this huge billowing cloud of dark smoke coming up not far from me. I called my girlfriend and she turned on the news and told me what it was so I was lucky enough to get really close. I got up to where the evacuation route was late last night, so the fire was fairly young even though from the video you can see it's really large, the wind is just going against me really strong. Tons of smoke and cash and other things in the air. I was able to hang out at an area where the police were either having people do a u-turn and go away if you did not live in the area, or allow certain cashes through that did live nearby so they could get to their x home.

HOLMES: I wish we could spend more time with you, but the president is about to speak on this so we need to let you go. We appreciate your video. We appreciate your time.

Don, over to you.

LEMON: Thank you. As you said we want to get to the White House. The president is going to speak about the war effort and the money, $4.2 billion.

PRES. GEORGE W. BUSH, UNITED STATES: That we must provide our troops with the help and support they need to get the job done. Parts of this war are complicated. But one part is not. That is, America should do what it takes to support our troops and protect our people.

And today, I sent Congress an updated supplemental war funding request that will do just that. The majority of the supplemental funding is for day-to-day military operations in Afghanistan and Iraq. The bill provides for basic needs, like bullets and body armor, protection against IEDs. And mind resistant ambush protected vehicles. It also funds training missions, vital embassy programs, improvements in Iraq and Iraqi security forces, and intelligence operations that protect our troops.

These are urgent military necessities. And the supplemental was prepared in close consultation with our commanders on the ground. The funding is what General Petraeus and military leaders say we need. In Congress, ought to give it to them. Our military commanders will use this money to continue carrying out their missions in Afghanistan and Iraq. In Afghanistan our troop, NATO allies and afghan forces are making gains against the Taliban and al Qaeda. In Iraq, our campaign to provide security for the Iraqi people has been difficult and dangerous. But it is achieving results. Al Qaeda and other extremists have been driven from places like Anbar province and parts of Delle province.

In Baghdad the number of Iraqi civilians murdered is down sharply. Throughout Iraq the number of American service members killed in September was the lowest since July 2006. And the level of violence during Ramadan was down significantly from last year. Last month General Petraeus said he believes that our successes in Iraq mean we can maintain the same level of security with fewer American forces. I accepted this recommendation that we not replace about 2,200 marine who is left Anbar last month. We expect to bring home another 3,500 soldiers by Christmas.

The funds in the supplemental are crucial to continuing this policy of return on success. Every member of Congress who wants to see both success in Iraq and our troops begin to come home should strongly support this bill. I know some in Congress are against the war. And are seeking ways to demonstrate that opposition. I recognize their position, and they should make their views heard. But they ought to make sure our troops have what it takes to succeed. Our men and women on the front lines should not be caught in the middle of partisan disagreements in Washington, D.C. I often hear that war critics oppose my decisions but still support the troops. Well, I'll take them at their word and this is a chance for them to show it. That they support the troops.

Along with support for our troops in Afghanistan, Iraq, the supplemental also includes emergency funding for other critical national security needs. It includes money to improve medical care for our wounded warriors. It funds equipment repair and upgrades of strategic readiness of the army. It provides crucial relief for Iraqi refugees. It's supporting the peacekeeping mission of the United Nations in Darfur. It delivers vital assistance for Mexico and Central America working to break up drug cartels and fight organized crime and stop human trafficking. All of these urgent priorities in the United States and the Congress ought to fund them without delay.

One reason Congress can move the supplemental quickly it had more than eight months to study most of the provisions. In fact, nearly 75 percent of the funding requested in the supplemental was submitted along with my annual budget in February. We took the step in direct response to requests from Congress. Members of Congress should consider the supplemental promptly. They should keep it focused on true necessities, not pet projects. They should pass a good clean bill as soon as possible. Congress should not go home for the holidays while our troops are still waiting for the funds they need. In addition to passing the supplemental, Congress also needs to complete clean appropriations bills for the departments of defense and veterans affairs.

The house and the senate passed versions of both of these bills. But leaders in the house have not named conferees. They should name them now, so that members of Congress can work out their differences and send me these vital bills as soon as possible.

I want to thank all of those standing with me today for their strong support for our troops, our veterans, and our military families.

May God bless you all. Thank you.

LEMON: The president today speaking at in the Roosevelt room asking for an additional $42.3 billion. He's calling it a war supplemental. That will bring the cost of 2008 to $189.3 billion. The original request was $141.7 billion. But it's $189.3 billion now so far for 2008, urging Congress to approve that saying if you're with the troops you'll approve that. The president also reiterating about 2,000 troops who withdrew from Anbar province earlier in the year, last month, he said we should not replace them. Also saying we're going to bring additional troops home by Christmas. We'll continue to follow this and bring it to you right here in the CNN NEWSROOM.

Betty.

NGUYEN: And we're also following breaking news out of California. Those wild fires that are just burning out of control, here is a live look at Malibu. Coming up, some 250,000 people are being forced to evacuate. What does the smoke danger mean to everyone dealing with this fire?

We're going to talk to medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen after the break.

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NGUYEN: I want you to look at this new video coming to us from Malibu. Look at this fire just burning out of control. One of dozens that are burning, some 250,000 people have been forced to evacuate. In fact, patients that were taken to hospitals are now being evacuated from the hospitals. We have now with us medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen to talk about the dangers of the smoke inhalation. We're looking at the video all day long. The smoke is everywhere.

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Right. It is. It's going to be extremely hard to get away from it. What people need to know about smoke, I think everyone knows it's not good for your lungs but that smoke can damage your seeing, can damage sinuses and people who have bad hearts can experience rapid heartbeat, shortness of breath, they can become extremely fatigued, so all of this plays into some of the scenes we're seeing of people being taken away on stretchers or assisted out of the scene. Now, what can you do? You know, if you can, if it's possible, stay inside. Obviously if you've been evacuated you have to get out. Some people who are sort of further away from the source, stay inside, close the windows, put the air conditioning on recycle so that you get airs from within your house than bringing air from outside the house. You want to be outdoors as little as possible and don't exercise outdoors. One of the few time us say don't exercise

NGUYEN: We're seeing these pictures coming in on the right side of the screen, you see some patients being evacuated. Whether you're a patient or someone who lives there, we're seeing a lot of picture where people with face masks on. Does that make a difference?

COHEN: The Florida Department of Health which has experience with wild fires, they don't recommend the masks. I don't think they would do damage but apparently they don't work beautifully. You also see people with wet towels on and those don't help either.

NGUYEN: We'll continue to watch. Thank you for that. We're staying on top of this fire all day long.

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