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500,000 Flee So Cal Firestorm

Powerful Santa Ana gusts drive wildfires; more than 800 buildings destroyed

By Lucas Laursen, Newser Staff

Posted Oct 23, 2007 4:58 AM CDT

(Newser) – High winds and hotter temperatures are forecast for Southern California today, frustrating firefighters struggling to contain the runaway blazes that have forced more than half a million people from their homes and consumed almost 900 buildings in the last two days. At least a dozen fires are still torching tinder-dry hillsides from Santa Barbara to the Mexican border, reports the Los Angeles Times. The worst damage is around San Diego and Lake Arrowhead.

Fires are moving so quickly some hotels serving as emergency shelters had to be evacuated. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger declared a state of emergency in seven counties and redeployed National Guard troops from border duty to help more than 5,000 firefighters. "It looked like the end of the world," Mitch Mendler, a San Diego firefighter, told the AP.

[Images (8)]

[Videos (1)]

A sky crane helicopter being used for the fire fighting dumps its load of water to slow the wind whipped Stevenson Ranch fire as it rages out of control in Valencia, Calif., north of Los Angeles, Monday,... (Associated Press)

Residents from Stevenson Ranch watch as a sky crane helicopter being used for the fire fighting effort scoops water from the 9th hole at the TPC Valencia golf coarse in Valencia, Calif., Monday Oct.... (Associated Press)

A Los Angeles County firefighter braces against wind and flames as fire leaps across Rambla Pacifico in the Santa Monica Mountains as fire continues to burn in Malibu, Calif., Monday, Oct. 22, 2007. ... (Associated Press)

An air tanker drops fire retardant near homes where a wildfire driven by powerful Santa Ana winds threatened homes, Monday, Oct. 22, 2007, in Malibu, Calif. (AP Photo/Mark J. Terrill) (Associated Press)

A two-story home is reduced to a pile of embers left from a brush fire in the Grass Valley area west of Lake Arrowhead, Calif. on Monday Oct. 22, 2007. (AP Photo/Mike Meadows) (Associated Press)

A two-story home is engulfed in flames from a brush fire in the Grass Valley area west of Lake Arrowhead, Calif. on Monday Oct. 22,2007. (AP Photo/Mike Meadows) (Associated Press)

Smoke rises from the Buckweed Fire, in the Santa Clarita, Calif. area is shown in the foreground, while the Ranch Fire near Piru in Ventura County, Calif. area is shown in the background on Monday, Oct.... (Associated Press)

The Orange County Fire burns east of Irvine, Calif. on Monday, Oct. 22, 2007. Wildfires fanned by fierce desert winds consumed huge swaths of bone-dry Southern California, burning buildings and forcing... (Associated Press)

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500,000 Flee So Cal Firestorm