Wildfire Spreads to Pioneertown. (Daily Bulletin 07122006).

For those that lost their Homes in Pioneer Town I am so sorry. I don't know what that is like. I have been Evacuated from my home and I have evacuated people from their homes due to their safety and impending doom, however the doom didn't happen and everything turned out alright. I only did that once as I was on the Fire Department at the same time that I was on the Police Department in my home town, and there was only once that I had to evacuate a small area of residence while I was in Uniform for the Police Department. It was hard because I wanted to fight the fire. AS it was I stayed out at the residents houses all night and made sure that no one got into their property. I also made sure that the fire stayed well away from their property too.

It was a long night but we got it done. The people were more thankful to the Fire Department and the job they had done to clear the fire then the one that I did protecting their property..

That is the way the cookie crumbles I guess. God bless and keep you and I Hope that my prayers get answered and none of your houses get damaged!!

BSRanch

Wildfire spreads to Pioneertown

Gina Tenorio, Guy McCarthy, & Joe Nelson, Daily Bulletin Writers.

YUCCA VALLEY - A fast-moving wildfire Tuesday in Pioneertown destroyed at least 30 structures, including homes, forced evacuations and triggered a local state of emergency.

Aided by low humidity and hot, seasonal winds, the fire, officially known as the Sawtooth Complex and informally being called the Ridge Fire, broke through containment lines Tuesday morning and mushroomed to more than 17,000 acres by 9:30 p.m.

Between 800 and 1,000 residents were under a mandatory order to evacuate about 3:30 p.m. from the historic Pioneertown and neighboring areas of Rimrock, Gamma Gulch, Flamingo Heights and Pipes Canyon. Late Tuesday, flames were threatening the Skyline Ranch area in the far eastern part of Yucca Valley.

Thousands of firefighters were expected to arrive at the low desert area in the high country of Big Morongo Canyon by the evening.

"It's been a total inferno," said Ryan Brooks, 32, sitting on a yellow four-wheeler watching a dozen-plus firefighters set up at an intersection. "We left this morning and there was just a little smoke. But later over there in Pioneertown it looked like 30- to 50-foot tornadoes of flame."

The San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors declared a state of emergency late Tuesday and put in a request to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger for disaster money.

By evening, five firefighters and two residents were reported injured, mostly minor burns, officials said. Three were hurt in the Pioneertown area when spot fires trapped them, said Battalion Chief Douglas Lannon of the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.

An evacuation center opened at Yucca Valley High School, but a dozen or so stressed residents who gathered outside Water Canyon Coffee Co. in Yucca Valley said few people planned to stay there.

Pioneertown residents are close-knit and were relying on friends and family outside the burn area for shelter, said resident Cheryl Allen, 48.

Allen said she had no idea if her house was safe. Without any information, she and the others were stopping anyone coming through for news.

Fire officials said as many as 50 homes might have burned by early evening.

In one incident, a fire crew happened upon a home that had caught fire.

"It was a lot of luck," said Capt. John Flesher of the San Bernardino County fire station in Muscoy. "We saw the front was burning and got over on it."

The challenge was fully dousing smoldering patches of burned debris, some of which continued burning hours later.

"Water up here is scarce," said Capt. Will Jennings of the county fire station in Mentone. "This community is built in such a vast area, the hydrant grid leaves the water sparse."

A series of lightning strikes Sunday ignited Sawtooth's initial trio of fires. Firefighters thought they had the upper hand on the fires until about 12:30 p.m. Tuesday when low humidity and prevailing westerly winds caused the Ridge Fire near Pioneertown to flare up and spread to the east, Lannon said.

The winds forced aircraft to be grounded for almost an hour in the afternoon. Crews on the ground continued to work the fire.

Ridgeline smoke was visible from as far west as Banning. Windmills in the San Gorgonio Pass were spinning like whirligigs in the late afternoon as smoke billowed from the fire area at least 1,000 feet up and several miles west.

Jim Austin, owner of Rimrock Ranch Cabins on Burns Canyon Road, said he knew the fire had gotten worse long before authorities arrived with the order to leave.

"It was getting very smoky," he said. "And you could smell that fire getting close."

He stayed long enough to ensure that the one guest staying at the cabins Tuesday made it safely out and then left with a few belongings to a home he keeps in San Diego, he said.

"I'm just hoping for the best," he said.

James Pourtemour, 24, was preparing to leave his family's 50-year-old homestead just as an inmate crew of firefighters was readying to protect the residence.

"I drove from Sky Harbor, 15 miles south of here, to make sure it doesn't burn down," he said.

Late Tuesday, a fire was seen burning on a ridge west of Morongo Valley. Motorists were stopped along Highway 62 watching the blaze. Residents on Navajo Trail were fretting because the fire was less than a mile from their homes.

Authorities said it was part the Millard Canyon Complex, a series of separate fires at heights of up to 7,000 feet in the San Bernardino National Forest, about 7 miles north of Cabazon near the Morongo Indian Reservation.

It was about 70 percent contained as of 9 p.m., having burned about 130 acres of brush, according to U.S. Forest Service reports.

More than 300 firefighters were on the scene.