Early Onslaught Of Wildfires In Southern California May Foretell A Replay Of 2002 Disaster

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- When they weren't racing to mountainsides and canyons to fight fast-moving, potentially deadly blazes this week, firefighters sometimes found themselves scratching their heads.

They do not usually see such major blazes in Southern California before Aug. 1. Most happen in October - the height of fire season - when hot Santa Ana winds can push flames across huge areas.

``A lot of us are looking at each other and saying, `Wait a minute, it's mid-July and this is happening,''' said Angeles National Forest spokesman Stanton Florea.

Firefighters fear the unprecedented early onslaught of wildfires could foretell a replay of last year's catastrophic fire season, when two dozen people were killed and more than 3,500 homes destroyed.

In the past week, blazes have burned across more than 48,000 acres of dry brush and trees in Southern California. Thousands of residents have been evacuated, but only a few homes and other structures have been lost so far.

Five years of drought have drained desert brush all but dry, while a bark-beetle infestation has killed thousands of trees in Southern California forests, prolonging the dire conditions firefighters faced last year.

``It's going to be like a double whammy, in that both factors will be coming together in the fall,'' said Ruth Wenstrom, a spokeswoman for the San Bernardino National Forest.

The three largest fires this week burned in communities in the shadow of Angeles National Forest, 30 to 60 miles north of Los Angeles. In recent years, the areas have been transformed into suburbs.

``Suburbia is getting more wild in nature as people are converting more wildland into more ranches and more larger homes,'' said Bruce Quintelier, a fire information officer with the U.S. Forest Service. ``Unfortunately, these are just tough areas for us to get into.''

Two major fires earlier this week - a 17,000-acre blaze near Lake Hughes and a 6,000-acre one that scorched hillsides and canyons on the edge of Santa Clarita - ``spread very rapidly, really, without any substantial wind behind them,'' said Los Angeles County fire Capt. Mark Savage.

Firefighters ordinarily knock such blazes down quickly, he said. But the drought has made brush and timber particularly susceptible to what firefighters call ``spotting,'' in which embers break loose from the main fire and float off, igniting other dry fuel when they touch down. That causes fires to grow rapidly and become dangerous for firefighters.

When the first report of a fire near Acton fire came in, for example, it was only at 50 acres. Within eight hours, it had exploded to more than 5,000 acres and was threatening almost 200 homes.

Last fall was the most disastrous fire season in California history. Gigantic blazes burned across more than 750,000 acres, destroying 3,650 homes and killing 24 people.

The blazes were created by everything from arson to a signal fire set by a lost hunter. Authorities blamed this week's fires on a variety of causes _ from arson to a hawk that hit a power line, caught fire and dropped to the ground.

Wenstrom attributed the limited loss of property so far this year to a combination of luck and skill on the part of firefighters. Also, most of the fires were not in areas with significant bark beetle infestations.

``When fire does get to that area,'' Wenstrom warned, ``it's going to be hotter, more explosive and more difficult to control.''