Los Angeles controls wildfire but danger remains

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - A respite in hot winds on Wednesday allowed firefighters to bring a wildfire under control after it swept through a landmark Los Angeles park and forced hundreds of residents from a wealthy neighborhood in the Hollywood Hills to abandon their homes overnight.

But with temperatures set to reach an unseasonable 90 degrees Fahrenheit (32 degrees Celsius) and afternoon winds a possibility, firefighters raced to stamp out the few hot spots still burning on the steep hills of bone-dry Griffith Park.

Officials said the blaze that began on Tuesday just east of the famed Hollywood sign had consumed 817 acres in the nation's largest urban park, home to landmarks like the Griffith Observatory and the Greek Theater.
"The winds are in our favor and we hope we will have full containment in the next 24 hours," Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa told a news conference, noting that the fire was about 50 percent contained around midday.

Local officials and media were calling it the worst fire in the Hollywood area in 50 years, a harbinger of things to come as southern California experiences its driest spring on record.

"We are facing an incredibly difficult fire season," Villaraigosa said, urging residents of the nation's second-largest city to clear brush.

Authorities believe the blaze might have been accidental. Firefighters rescued a man who walked out of the brush with burns on his chest, saying he had fallen asleep while smoking a cigarette.

He was hospitalized and questioned by investigators, but had not been charged with starting the fire, officials said. No other injuries were reported.
Some of the 300 people evacuated from 150 houses were allowed to return early in the morning. Overnight, firefighters had entered homes with hoses to douse the brush from the balconies that look out onto the park's steep terrain.


Source: reauters.com