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American Morning
California Wildfires: State of Destruction
Aired October 28, 2003 - 07:33 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Some of the most devastating blazes have been in the San Diego area where officials say the fire damage is the worst in more than 30 years.
Jeff Flock is live for us in San Diego this morning.
Jeff, good morning.
JEFF FLOCK, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Indeed, Soledad, good morning. Looking bad here as well. The good news I suppose today is that again the Santa Ana winds abated here. And so the fire --current fire is not so bad.
But take a look at what this fire has wrought. We are now pushing 600 homes destroyed in San Diego County, a very, very difficult situation in places like this.
And we have spent a lot of time out on the fire lines over the course of the last few days. Looks now about 300,000 acres burned. And we have been seeing this fire through the eyes of the firefighters.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JEFF FLOCK, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Walking the blazing fire lines with Nick Rich (ph) is like going to fire school.
NICK RICH, FIREFIGHTER: Fire is going to run uphill.
FLOCK: He knows where it's been and why. Rich has been a firefighter, fire chief, paramedic, medevac pilot.
RICH: These are just the leaves that were on the ground and they burnt pretty quick.
FLOCK: He notices things, the chopper doing infrared mapping of the blackened mountainside for hot spots, the ground squirrel forced up out of his borough by the heat, the old growth tree turned into a chimney by a ground fire.
RICH: The roots underneath the ground caught fire. Now it's starting to burn up through the center of the tree. You follow the burned pattern all the way up to the top, you'll see it's actually venting out the top.
FLOCK: Rich marks the weakened tree with special tape called killer tree to alert fire crews it could fall on them. RICH: The problem we have here is we have very limited access in this canyon.
FLOCK: Standing on scorched earth, Rich explains how instead of attacking the flames here, firefighters earlier built this backfire down the mountain to burn the fuel in the path of the blaze and choke off the main fire.
RICH: If it came in here and got up into the trees, the fire has now crowned, then it's really harder for them to fight at that point.
FLOCK: In his eyes with a little help from diminished Santa Ana winds, this battle with nature has gone better than it could have so far.
FLOCK (on camera): So this was a success in here.
RICH: Definitely. You can tell that by all the residences are still here.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FLOCK: A success there, perhaps, but some failures here. Again, Soledad, we're looking at almost 600 homes at this count destroyed here in San Diego County alone. That's the three key fires here, the Cedar Fire, the Dizura (ph) Fire down to the south and the Paradise Fire we were out on yesterday, not a good situation.
O'BRIEN: No, clearly it's not. Jeff Flock for us this morning. Jeff, thanks. We will, of course, check in with you throughout the morning.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired October 28, 2003 - 07:33 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Some of the most devastating blazes have been in the San Diego area where officials say the fire damage is the worst in more than 30 years.
Jeff Flock is live for us in San Diego this morning.
Jeff, good morning.
JEFF FLOCK, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Indeed, Soledad, good morning. Looking bad here as well. The good news I suppose today is that again the Santa Ana winds abated here. And so the fire --current fire is not so bad.
But take a look at what this fire has wrought. We are now pushing 600 homes destroyed in San Diego County, a very, very difficult situation in places like this.
And we have spent a lot of time out on the fire lines over the course of the last few days. Looks now about 300,000 acres burned. And we have been seeing this fire through the eyes of the firefighters.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JEFF FLOCK, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Walking the blazing fire lines with Nick Rich (ph) is like going to fire school.
NICK RICH, FIREFIGHTER: Fire is going to run uphill.
FLOCK: He knows where it's been and why. Rich has been a firefighter, fire chief, paramedic, medevac pilot.
RICH: These are just the leaves that were on the ground and they burnt pretty quick.
FLOCK: He notices things, the chopper doing infrared mapping of the blackened mountainside for hot spots, the ground squirrel forced up out of his borough by the heat, the old growth tree turned into a chimney by a ground fire.
RICH: The roots underneath the ground caught fire. Now it's starting to burn up through the center of the tree. You follow the burned pattern all the way up to the top, you'll see it's actually venting out the top.
FLOCK: Rich marks the weakened tree with special tape called killer tree to alert fire crews it could fall on them. RICH: The problem we have here is we have very limited access in this canyon.
FLOCK: Standing on scorched earth, Rich explains how instead of attacking the flames here, firefighters earlier built this backfire down the mountain to burn the fuel in the path of the blaze and choke off the main fire.
RICH: If it came in here and got up into the trees, the fire has now crowned, then it's really harder for them to fight at that point.
FLOCK: In his eyes with a little help from diminished Santa Ana winds, this battle with nature has gone better than it could have so far.
FLOCK (on camera): So this was a success in here.
RICH: Definitely. You can tell that by all the residences are still here.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
FLOCK: A success there, perhaps, but some failures here. Again, Soledad, we're looking at almost 600 homes at this count destroyed here in San Diego County alone. That's the three key fires here, the Cedar Fire, the Dizura (ph) Fire down to the south and the Paradise Fire we were out on yesterday, not a good situation.
O'BRIEN: No, clearly it's not. Jeff Flock for us this morning. Jeff, thanks. We will, of course, check in with you throughout the morning.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
