GOLETA (CBSLA/AP) — A fast-moving brush fire in the Santa Barbara County community of Goleta has damaged or destroyed 20 homes and structures and was threatening scores more Saturday morning, as thousands of people evacuated to safety. (Santa Barbara County Fire Department spokesman Mike Eliason/Twitter) The Holiday Fire started as a structure fire sometime before 8:45 p.m. on North Fairview Avenue, above Goleta, and quickly spread to nearby brush, the Santa Barbara County Fire Department reports. The fire had burned at least 60 acres as of 8 a.m. Saturday morning and was only 5 percent contained. Total calm Saturday morning replaced the 50 mile-per-hour gusts and forward progress of the fire was stopped, Santa Barbara County Fire Capt. Dave Zaniboni said. “It’s really given us a good opportunity to get in there and get some work done,” Zaniboni said, cautioning that critical fire weather warnings would remain in effect until the evening. An excessive heat warning was in effect until 9 p.m. for Santa Barbara County, the National Weather Service reported, while a red flag warning was in effect through 6 p.m. (Mike Eliason/Twitter) Evacuations were in effect for about 2,500 people. They applied to areas north of the Cathedral Oaks neighborhood to West Camino Cielo Road, and from La Patera Lane, west to North Patterson Avenue. All roads going north from La Patera Lane to Patterson Avenue, along Cathedral Oaks, were closed to the public. (Santa Barbara County Office of Emergency Management/Google Maps) An evacuation center was set up at Goleta Valley Community Center, located at 5679 Hollister Ave. 350 fire personnel were battling the blaze from the ground and in the air, with water-dropping choppers and air tankers. There have been no reported injuries. California Gov. Jerry Brown declared a state of emergency for Santa Barbara County Saturday morning. As some houses smoldered, a few residents who hadn’t left or had managed to return surveyed damage that seemed random: destroyed homes next to others completely intact. Eric Durtschi stood outside his destroyed house, where a burned-out car stood in the driveway and kids’ bicycles were strewn about. Durtschi, his wife and six children had left Utah and moved in just a few weeks ago. He said he hadn’t yet told his two oldest children their home was gone. He managed to collect his severely burned vintage guns, hoping to salvage them. Meanwhile, a neighbor across the street saw his home spared. The man had stayed through the night spraying down other people’s houses. The area is west of where the Thomas Fire, California’s largest in history, raged last December . That blaze destroyed more than 1,000 buildings in Ventura and Santa Barbara counties. (© Copyright 2018 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)
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Brush Fire Rips Through Goleta; At Least 20 Structures Destroyed, Thousands Evacuated
