Park Rangers Rescue Distraught Family Trapped After Fire Breaks Out on a Ring Mountain Ridge

Two county park rangers rescued a distraught Fairfax family Wednesday night as a blaze erupted on a Ring Mountain ridge where several dozen residents gathered to watch fireworks across the region.

Quick action by firefighters from six agencies doused the smoky brush fire before it burned more than an acre on the edge of the county open space preserve near the end of Endeavor Drive in Corte Madera.

At the same time as reports of the fire poured in, county parks Superintendent Brian Sanford and Supervising Ranger Richard Gibson, on patrol to monitor fireworks sightseers, heard a 911 dispatch report that a family of four was trapped by the blaze and did not know how to get out of harm's way.

"Rich and I hear that and gun it," said Sanford, a 30-year veteran of the county department. "We're two minutes away," in separate vehicles.

Sanford, who earlier had ejected three juveniles from the preserve who he found smoking cigarettes in the high grass, headed down the Endeavor fire road and was confronted by a distraught Adriana Moreno of Fairfax and her two children, Gian, 6, and Adrian, 4, as they ran up the road. The father, Gustavo Moreno, had walked down the road to determine whether the cloud billowing in the shadows ahead was fog or smoke.

"The fireworks had ended and we had packed up our picnic and headed down, but when we saw what appeared to be a weird fog was actually smoke, I walked down and saw the fire," Gustavo Moreno said. Moreno wasn't taking any chances: If the wind blew in the family's direction, they would be trapped.

"I called 911 and minutes later the ranger was there," he said, adding one ranger picked up his wife and children, and the other came down the road to get him, escorting the family to a parking area.

Moreno had high praise for the rangers as well as firefighters who responded immediately and doused the blaze in short order. "They were all quick," he said. "Very quick."

Peter Davis, a Corte Madera fire battalion chief on loan to the Southern Marin Fire Protection District, said he arrived with a Southern Marin team along with Corte Madera and Larkspur authorities shortly after 10 p.m. to find a half-acre of brush and grassland burning on a ridgeline near the end of Endeavor Drive in Corte Madera.

About 40 people had convened at the ridge to watch fireworks and those remaining in the area were evacuated. The initial firefighting crews, with help from Mill Valley, Tiburon and county fire units, had the blaze under control in 20 minutes.

Davis noted the effort was aided by high humidity due to heavy mist. Winds were light.

The fire burned about three-quarters of an acre.

Cause of the fire was listed as "suspicious," and could have been sparked by anything from fireworks to a cigarette, Davis said. Parks officials blamed youths with cigarettes.

Investigators planned to return to the site Thursday.