On the front lines of wildfires, firefighters again face relentless foe: wind

Reporting from OAKMONT, Calif. —  Firefighters were asleep in Healdsburg early Saturday morning when they got the call — get over to the Oakmont neighborhood of Santa Rosa.

High winds overnight had sent the Nuns fire branching toward the city, which was already devastated by the Tubbs fire earlier in the week. Another branch was heading toward the city of Sonoma.

“It was cranking,” said Jeff Allen, a Cal Fire spokesman.

When firefighters arrived, police we helping to evacuate the area.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen that many cop cars Code 3,” Allen said, meaning they were flashing their lights and blaring their sirens.

The firefighters headed up the ridge in the darkness, trying to hold the flames at bay with hoses and shovels. When the sun came up, air tankers and helicopters started dropping fire retardant and water. Bulldozers cut through the earth to make fire breaks and firefighters set backfires to slow the blaze’s advance.

They were helped by the weather as winds started to slow.

It was a “good knockdown,” Allen said.

The ridge remained blanketed with smoke late Saturday morning as helicopters circled. Occasionally a tall tree would become engulfed, and flickers of flames would be briefly visible from the road.

More than 10,000 firefighters from California and other states are fighting the blazes in Northern California, and officials are readying more crews in Southern California, where a red flag warning is in place through Sunday.

“The winds aloft did surface at about 2:30 this morning in the central Napa Valley region,” Cal Fire fire protection deputy director Dave Teter said at a news conference Saturday afternoon. As expected, those increased winds causes some fires to spread overnight and triggered evacuations in Sonoma County and elsewhere.

It was that kind of day on the fire lines of wine country as the return of strong winds prompted new evacuations and concerns that several days of progress could be undone.

The winds are expected to continue through the afternoon, keeping the region on edge as searchers continue to look for the bodies of victims. So far, at least 38 people have died.

Cal Fire estimates that around 5,700 buildings were damaged or destroyed. Friday night into Saturday morning the Nuns fire “’did make a strong run into the city of Sonoma,” causing damage to some more buildings, Teter said.

Firefighting resources include 880 fire engines, 134 bulldozers, 224 hand crews and 138 water tenders, Teter said. At first light Saturday, 14 helicopters were in the air performing water drops.