More evacuations called for residents in path of growing Pier Fire east of Porterville

More evacuations were added Friday for homes threatened by the 6,794-acre Pier Fire, east of Springville in Tulare County, including voluntary evacuations for the town of Springville.

More than 1,100 firefighters are battling the blaze, which began Tuesday. It has no containment and is spreading north and south of the Tule River near Highway 190.

The fire grew almost 1,500 acres on Thursday. The cause remains under investigation.

On Friday morning, Tulare County and emergency operations center officials started making reverse 911 calls to residents in the Springville area to tell residents they should consider voluntary evacuations.

Early Friday, the fire was spurred by winds aligning with the Tule River drainage and moved down Coffee Canyon into Long Valley north of Cow Mountain. Fire officials recommended mandatory evacuation of Rio Vista, an area of 18 homes and 40 people. No structures were damaged.

Recently built fire control lines kept the fire west of Sequoia Crest. Firefighters will continue strengthening control lines from Sequoia Crest to Camp Nelson.

To the west, firefighters were keeping the fire east of Rio Vista and the fire hasn’t advanced north of the Wishon River drainage or south into the Tule River Indian Reservation.

Mandatory evacuations have been called for: Rio Vista, Pierpoint Springs, Wishon, Doyle Springs, Alpine, Sequoia Crest, Cedar Slope, Mountain Aire (Rogers Camp) and Camp Nelson. Ponderosa and Springville are under a voluntary evacuation order.

An evacuation center is open at Porterville College’s student conference center, 100 E. College Ave., Porterville.

Closed roads include: Highway 190, east of Springville, which is closed to eastbound traffic at Balch Park Road; and Mountain Road 107 (Western Divide Highway), which is closed to westbound traffic at Fox Road in Ponderosa.

This story was originally published September 1, 2017 at 1:19 PM with the headline "More evacuations called for residents in path of growing Pier Fire east of Porterville."