Calif. Wildfires Force 3,000 Campers To Evacuate

Sunday, May 20th 2007, 2:30 pm

By: News On 6

GORMAN, Calif. (AP) _ A fast-moving wildfire had burned more than 2,500 acres Sunday and chased thousands of people from campsites near Los Padres National Forest, authorities said.

No injuries were reported. The fire was 50 percent surrounded by early Sunday morning, said Los Angeles County fire Capt. Mike Brown.

More than 3,000 people were evacuated from four campsites in the area, Brown said.

The fire was reported at about 2 p.m. Saturday near the Golden State Freeway about 70 miles north of Los Angeles. By early Sunday it had scorched nearly 4 square miles.

The 250 firefighters on the lines were helped by lower nighttime temperatures.

The cause of the blaze was under investigation, authorities said.

Southern California Edison reported 18 homes were without power due to the fire, but authorities said no homes were immediately threatened.

Elsewhere, a wildfire that had threatened homes and other structures in two northern Arizona forests was 80 percent contained. Twenty-one evacuees were allowed home Sunday.

Officials projected full containment of the 6-square-mile Promontory fire by Tuesday. Fire managers began sending home some of the nearly 700 firefighters working on the blaze, fire spokeswoman Lori Cook said.

Rain helped firefighters fight a blaze that burned 27 square miles of forest in the dry southern New Jersey Pinelands. The New Jersey Forest Fire Service had the fire 90 percent contained Saturday, said Bert Plante, a division fire warden.

At the height of the fire, 6,000 people were evacuated and a handful of homes were damaged or destroyed.