Firefighters made significant progress overnight against the Holy fire burning in the Cleveland National Forest near Lake Elsinore, raising the fire's containment to 29 percent, officials said Saturday.
The fire has been burning along inaccessible ridges and mountains in Orange and Riverside counties since Monday, chewing through bone-dry chaparral, short grass and brush that have not burned in decades.
As of Saturday morning, the Holy fire _ named for Holy Jim Canyon Road, near where the fire got its start _ had burned 21,473 acres and 12 structures, officials said. A damage assessment team was working in the fire area Saturday to determine whether more structures had been damaged or destroyed, Nguyen said.
Residents, who had evacuated the McVicker Canyon neighborhood just east of Cleveland National Park, returned Saturday morning to find that firefighters, and a few homeowners who stayed behind, had saved their homes.
"Thank you is not enough for these firemen," said Minnie Gaucin, who watched the Thursday afternoon drama on a surveillance camera feed from her sister's house in Temecula, as firefighters used hoses and hand tools to save her home.
"They were back in our yard putting the fire out, four or five firemen" Gaucin said. "I was watching my own home. On my phone. The flames were very high. I started crying. I wanted my home to be safe."
On Saturday she found there was no damage, "just ashes everywhere."
High temperatures, steep terrain and dry grasses and other fuels on the mountains have made firefighting difficult, said Thanh Nguyen, a public information officer for an incident management team assigned to the fire.
Thunderstorms, soaring temperatures, gusty winds and dry conditions were expected this weekend, creating a period of "near critical fire weather," officials said in a news release.
Wind gusts also have lifted embers out of the main blaze and deposited them in new areas, sparking fires that stretch the firefighters thin, Nguyen said.
"All those things make it difficult," she said.
Orange County authorities arrested Forrest Gordon Clark, 51, this week and charged him with multiple counts of arson in connection with the Holy fire.
Clark had a brief court appearance in Santa Ana Friday, during which he made several outbursts, calling the charges against him a "lie" and insisting again that he was being threatened. His bail was set at $1 million. His arraignment was set for Aug. 17.
More than 13,000 firefighters are battling 18 blazes across California. The fires have scorched more than 650,000 acres.
The largest are the Mendocino Complex fires, the biggest recorded in California history. The blaze, made up of the Ranch and River fires, had burned more than 325,226 acres as of Saturday morning. The Ranch fire was 58 percent contained, and the River fire was 92 percent contained.
In Redding, the 186,416-acre Carr fire was 55 percent contained. That fire destroyed 1,881 structures, including 1,077 homes and other residential structures, and threatened 528 others.
