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CNN Sunday Morning

Interview With Steve Ritchie

Aired November 02, 2003 - 09:44   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.


RENAY SAN MIGUEL, CNN ANCHOR: Most of the wildfires in California are close to being fully contained. But in one area fire fighters still have a lot of work to do. The first fire to break out was the old fire in San Bernardino. More than a week later, it has laid claim to more than 90,000 acres of mostly woodland and 850 homes, and it isn't finished yet.
For the latest on the fires around San Bernardino, we are joined on the phone by Steve Ritchie. He is with the U.S. Forest Service. Mr. Ritchie, thanks for being with us. What is the status report now on all of the fires we know of so far?

STEVE RITCHIE, U.S. FOREST SERVICE: I'm specifically from the old fire. And we are now at 65 percent containment. And these numbers are as of 6:00 last night. They have not published numbers yet this morning.

We had a good night last night. Not much in the way of flare- ups. There was one little swap-over in one place, and they just jumped on that and got it taken care of. We have made good progress. Cutting lines, the weather has been our friend for the last two or three days. And the firefighters have done literally a heroic job getting the work done on this fire. Even though there's a lot of work to do yet.

SAN MIGUEL: The weather has helped out. It's been colder and wetter there, but I'm wondering if it's also -- I know in some areas of southern California, maybe not there at the old fire, there have been mudslides, that can cause trouble with the firefighters on the lines as well as trying to get trucks and the equipment that you need up there. Are you facing that particular situation near the old fire?

RITCHIE: Yes, we are. We had a rockslide and mudslide that closed a major highway into the fire area yesterday. Which made firefighters, you know, have to detour around and take a lot longer to get where they were going.

We're also having other problems that the fire has caused. You know, we have quite a number of communities that have been evacuated. We do have some of them going back. But we have an area that is totally without electricity. The mountain area of all these communities is fed by two major power transmission feeds, and we've lost both of them in the fire. It's going to take quite some time to get electricity restored to this area. And we're talking maybe weeks, and nobody knows how long. The water has been interrupted. Gas service has been interrupted. So all the utilities are a very big problem. So people going back into their homes will have to essentially be camping out, because they will not have any utility support.

SAN MIGUEL: The weather, is that also impacting the aerial support your fire fighters are getting in terms of dumping water and flame retardant chemicals? Or are they able to fly in that kind of weather?

RITCHIE: We've flown for the last three days. Two days ago we had 22 helicopters just hammering the areas where the firefighters couldn't get to because of terrain. Yesterday there were 17. Today there's going to be 11. The fact they are downsizing that is a transition that's going on here from structure protection, because it's not necessary in some areas anymore, because they are getting the fire contained. But we still have many crews out there, bulldozer crews and hand crews, that are continuing to cut line on the fire.

SAN MIGUEL: Well, we hope the weather continues to cooperate. And we wish you continued success in that operation. We know you'll keep us posted on things. Steve Ritchie, a Fire Information Officer with the U.S. Forest Service, thanks so much for your time.

RITCHIE: Thank you very much.

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 November 2, 2003 - 09:44   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
RENAY SAN MIGUEL, CNN ANCHOR: Most of the wildfires in California are close to being fully contained. But in one area fire fighters still have a lot of work to do. The first fire to break out was the old fire in San Bernardino. More than a week later, it has laid claim to more than 90,000 acres of mostly woodland and 850 homes, and it isn't finished yet.
For the latest on the fires around San Bernardino, we are joined on the phone by Steve Ritchie. He is with the U.S. Forest Service. Mr. Ritchie, thanks for being with us. What is the status report now on all of the fires we know of so far?

STEVE RITCHIE, U.S. FOREST SERVICE: I'm specifically from the old fire. And we are now at 65 percent containment. And these numbers are as of 6:00 last night. They have not published numbers yet this morning.

We had a good night last night. Not much in the way of flare- ups. There was one little swap-over in one place, and they just jumped on that and got it taken care of. We have made good progress. Cutting lines, the weather has been our friend for the last two or three days. And the firefighters have done literally a heroic job getting the work done on this fire. Even though there's a lot of work to do yet.

SAN MIGUEL: The weather has helped out. It's been colder and wetter there, but I'm wondering if it's also -- I know in some areas of southern California, maybe not there at the old fire, there have been mudslides, that can cause trouble with the firefighters on the lines as well as trying to get trucks and the equipment that you need up there. Are you facing that particular situation near the old fire?

RITCHIE: Yes, we are. We had a rockslide and mudslide that closed a major highway into the fire area yesterday. Which made firefighters, you know, have to detour around and take a lot longer to get where they were going.

We're also having other problems that the fire has caused. You know, we have quite a number of communities that have been evacuated. We do have some of them going back. But we have an area that is totally without electricity. The mountain area of all these communities is fed by two major power transmission feeds, and we've lost both of them in the fire. It's going to take quite some time to get electricity restored to this area. And we're talking maybe weeks, and nobody knows how long. The water has been interrupted. Gas service has been interrupted. So all the utilities are a very big problem. So people going back into their homes will have to essentially be camping out, because they will not have any utility support.

SAN MIGUEL: The weather, is that also impacting the aerial support your fire fighters are getting in terms of dumping water and flame retardant chemicals? Or are they able to fly in that kind of weather?

RITCHIE: We've flown for the last three days. Two days ago we had 22 helicopters just hammering the areas where the firefighters couldn't get to because of terrain. Yesterday there were 17. Today there's going to be 11. The fact they are downsizing that is a transition that's going on here from structure protection, because it's not necessary in some areas anymore, because they are getting the fire contained. But we still have many crews out there, bulldozer crews and hand crews, that are continuing to cut line on the fire.

SAN MIGUEL: Well, we hope the weather continues to cooperate. And we wish you continued success in that operation. We know you'll keep us posted on things. Steve Ritchie, a Fire Information Officer with the U.S. Forest Service, thanks so much for your time.

RITCHIE: Thank you very much.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com