Norte Fire Reaches 92 Percent Containment as Crews Repair Fire Lines Ahead of the Rain
Containment rose from 80 percent on Monday to 90 percent on Tuesday and 92 percent by Tuesday evening, while the fire held at 570 acres. With residents back home, the work has shifted to undoing the damage that firefighting itself did to the hillsides, before rain reaches the burn scar tonight.
The Norte Fire reached 92 percent containment by Tuesday evening, FOX 11 Los Angeles reported, up from the 90 percent the Orange County Fire Authority announced on Tuesday and the 80 percent recorded on Monday. The burned area held at 570 acres in San Clemente and San Juan Capistrano, and residents displaced over the weekend are back in their homes.
In its Tuesday statement, the fire authority said, "Containment has increased to 90%," with crews working the edge of the burn, hunting for heat that is still alive and tightening the containment lines. Two closures outlast the evacuations. North of Esperanza, Via La Mirada remains shut to vehicles while crews work, and nobody is allowed into the burn scar, which stays closed until further notice because the hazard there is still active.
The new phase of the work is suppression repair. Scott Hatch, a wildland resource planner with the fire authority, told FOX 11 that crews are fixing the damage the suppression effort itself caused, including dozer lines cut into hillsides and fencing. To return the landscape toward its original state, crews are shredding heavy branches and brush left behind during containment work and installing straw wattles, long rolls of straw staked into the ground across exposed hillsides to slow water runoff and hold soil in place.
The repair is racing the weather. The fire authority says the goal is to protect vulnerable slopes from erosion and landslides ahead of the coming rainfall, and The Weather Channel forecasts showers over the coast on Wednesday turning to thunderstorms on Wednesday night, with about half an inch of rain expected in Laguna Beach in total. Erosion can occur with any sort of rain, Hatch noted, so the wattles are meant to dissipate raindrops whether the rain that arrives is light or heavy.
Mop-up continues alongside the repair. Fire authority crews are working shifts of more than 12 hours, using drones and infrared technology to scan the burned area for heat that cannot be seen with the naked eye, so ground crews can be sent to the spots that could reignite. Capt. Wayhowe Huang of the fire authority cautioned that hot spots can end up reigniting even when a fire appears to be out, which is why crews remain on the ground.
Seven homes were damaged or destroyed in the fire, and officials confirmed that no residents were injured. In San Juan Capistrano, community members have rallied around the crews this week, delivering food, drinks and thanks to the firefighters still working the scar. The fire began at 11:33 a.m. on Friday, near Portico Del Norte and Eminencia Del Norte in San Clemente. Its cause remains under investigation.
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