The Santa Barbara County Air Pollution Control District downgraded its concern about fire-related air quality on Friday, but advised local residents and visitors to monitor conditions since they can change quickly depending on winds.
“Smoke and ash from the Alisal Fire still have the potential to affect air quality, but any impacts are not expected to be as significant as they were earlier this week,” APCD officials said Friday.
As containment of the Alisal Fire grows through the weekend, “significant new smoke production is not expected,” according to a smoke forecast issued Friday.
Check real-time air quality conditions and forecasts at https://fire.airnow.gov/ and https://www.ourair.org/todays-air-quality/.
Firefighting crews were able to establish containment lines around 50% of the Alisal Fire by Saturday morning, and calm weather enabled massive air support from water-dropping helicopters and retardant-dropping air tankers.
Efforts were concentrated on the western edge of the fire, near Gaviota, where there was the most fire activity, incident commanders said.
An aerial video of the Alisal Fire from Travis Thane of the California Interagency Incident Management Team 1 (CIIMT1) shows conditions on Friday, as crews worked on making containment lines around the blaze and extinguishing hot spots on the interior.
There was an increase in fire activity and smoke production Friday, but crews were making good progress on containment, according to CIIMT1.
Hand crews and aircraft were trying to prevent the flames from moving northwest, and tankers have been dropping retardant on the ridge line above County Fire Station 38.
#Alisal Fire – On the western edge of the fire Friday near Mariposa Reina and Hwy 101, a DC-10 lays a carpet of Phos-chek on the ground. Both air and ground resources continue to make progress on the fire, which began Monday. pic.twitter.com/2C243Jf3XH
— SBCFireInfo (@EliasonMike) October 15, 2021
“Interior islands are burning along the northern and eastern portions of the fire; they’re currently not a threat to the perimeter,” according to CIIMT1.
Most of the Gaviota Coast area that is burning in the Alisal Fire has not burned for decades, since the 1955 Gaviota Fire, according to fire history maps.
The fire has burned 17,200 acres in southern Santa Barbara County and so far destroyed three residences and two outbuildings.
The flames have also damaged park and preserve properties and some equipment at the county’s Tajiguas Landfill.
“Hopefully we get this fire contained in the next few days,” said Chris Childers, a Santa Barbara County Fire Department battalion chief and member of CIIMT1.
He explained the path of the fire in a Friday morning briefing video and said there has been more heat on the western edge of the blaze, which is why they have sent “a whole lot of aircraft” and ground crews to the area.
Los Padres Natural Forest issued an order for an Alisal Fire Closure Area Friday, which prohibits entering any national forest campground, trail system within the affected area.
The incident command page is here: https://inciweb.nwcg.gov/incident/7862/
The county’s Alisal Fire information page is here: https://readysbc.org/alisal-fire/
At 5:30 p.m., the evacuation order for Arroyo Quemada Lane and the evacuation warning for areas east of El Capitan Canyon were both canceled, according to a tweet by Los Padres National Forest.
The county’s interactive evacuation map is here: https://sbcoem.maps.arcgis.com/apps/webappviewer/index.html?id=85bd16aeb11f431787a9ce571096a869
— Noozhawk managing editor Giana Magnoli can be reached at gmagnoli@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk on Twitter: @noozhawk, @NoozhawkNews and @NoozhawkBiz. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.
