BILL MARTINEZ
Associated Press Writer
RIDGECREST, Calif. (AP) -- Army soldiers headed for the fire lines Tuesday to help out weary civilians battling wildfires in 10 Western states, including a giant blaze in the Sierra Nevada that destroyed seven homes.
Some 50 blazes have blackened at least 663,500 acres of forest, brush and grass in Arizona, California, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah, Washington and Wyoming in the past two weeks.
With at least 10,700 firefighters deployed, resources stretched thin and fatigue setting in, 500 soldiers left Fort Hood, Texas, on Tuesday on their way to Idaho. They were to be given a day of field training before going to work on a 15,000-acre fire north of the central Idaho resort of McCall.
At Camp Pendleton in southern California, about 500 Marines begin classroom training Friday before they also head to Idaho.
Killeen Daily Herald Photo
4th Infantry Division soldiers from Fort Hood, Texas prepare to leave to help firefighters battle wildfires Monday. Fire Protection at Fort Hood Monday. About 500 troops are scheduled to leave Fort Hood for Burgdorf Junction, Idaho, today.
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Weather was causing havoc on the fire lines.
``We are getting a lot more dry lightning, a lot of heat and high winds gusting to 30 mph in the Great Basin, eastern California and Montana,'' said Ed Waldapfel, spokesman for the National Interagency Fire Center in Boise, Idaho.
This year is shaping up to be the worst fire season since 1988, when 7.4 million acres were burned nationwide.
``There were 2.2 million acres burned year-to-date in 1988. We're already at 3.5 million and we're just coming into fire season in most of the West,'' said Michelle Barret of the fire center in Boise.
Fire bosses said it would be weeks before some of the blazes are contained.
The largest wildfire in California had burned through 63,270 acres of the Sequoia National Forest, near Ridgecrest on the eastern side of the Sierra Nevada, or 120 miles north of Los Angeles.
Seven homes were destroyed Saturday in the Kennedy Meadows area, a remote hamlet at 6,000 feet, and 11 firefighters suffered minor injuries. Most of the hamlet's 43 permanent residents fled during the weekend and were still out of their homes Tuesday.
``There were 30- to 40-foot high flames. I thought my uniform was going to melt,'' firefighter Robert Cisneros said.
It was one of six California fires.
In Idaho, 13 wildfires were burning Tuesday, including the 83,000-acre Salmon-Challis National Forest blaze. In southeastern Idaho, the 850-acre West Fork blaze threatened 10 homes and 10 commercial structures in Lava Hot Springs, but it was close to being contained.
Montana firefighters battled nine fires, including a giant six-blaze complex that had blackened 55,800 acres five miles east of Ashland in the southeast corner of the state.
In northeast Nevada, a lightning-caused fire that had charred 66,188 acres of grass, brush and pinion pine was 80 percent complete and fire bosses aimed for full containment Wednesday. The fire northeast of Wells had caused no serious injuries and the only structural losses appeared to be four camp trailers.
In southeastern Nevada, a fire that had blackened 15,770 acres overran two ranch buildings.
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