Crews Fully Contain Southern CA Blaze

Nov. 21 -- Firefighters reached full containment on the Woolsey Fire on Wednesday, just under two weeks after the deadly blaze broke out and hours before a weak rain storm was expected to move through the area and bring further threat to homes.

The massive wildfire claimed three lives and consumed at least 1,640 structures grew to 151 square miles — nearly the size of metropolitan Denver — across Ventura and Los Angeles counties.

It broke out the afternoon of Thursday, Nov. 8, in Woolsey Canyon, east of Simi Valley. It soon spread toward Thousand Oaks, forcing evacuations there on the heels of a mass shooting that claimed 12 lives at a local bar earlier that Thursday.

Evacuations impacted a large swath of the Santa Monica Mountains and surrounding communities, tens of thousands evacuated from Camarillo to Malibu.

Among the dead is Alfred Deciutiis, a 73-year-old retired oncologist who chose to remain in his home in an unincorporated area of the Santa Monica Mountains south of Agoura Hills despite mandatory evacuations.

Coroner’s officials have yet to positively identify the two others killed, a man and woman whose remains were found in a burnt-out SUV in Malibu the day after the blaze broke out.

Many fear the danger has not yet passed for the area’s residents, with mudflows potentially trigged by a storm system forecast to hit the region late Wednesday night.

Authorities have been working to prepare residents with sandbags and other safety measures in an effort to avoid a repeat of the debris flows earlier this year and killed 21 people in Santa Barbara County following the Thomas Fire.

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