Winds calm down near South Lake Tahoe as Caldor Fire passes 210,000 acres
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California Wildfires
The latest on the wildfires burning in California. Get updates on the Caldor Fire, Dixie Fire and others, including size, containment, evacuation orders and more.
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Get the latest updates >> Caldor Fire grows minimally near Tahoe as winds stay calm, but spot fires linger
Fire crews benefited from calmer winds overnight, but the Caldor Fire continues to threaten thousands of structures in the Lake Tahoe Basin due to the presence of critically dry fuels.
A National Weather Service red flag warning, in place since Monday afternoon, expired Wednesday evening, and forecasts call for single-digit wind speeds in South Lake Tahoe through at least Saturday.
The blaze as of Thursday morning was burning southeast of Pioneer Trail, after jumping Highway 89 earlier this week.
The city of South Lake Tahoe, home to about 22,000 people, remains under a mandatory evacuation order, as well as communities just south of the city limits and up along the west shore of the lake, up to the El Dorado-Placer county line. Orders are also in place for Alpine County near Kirkwood.
Mandatory evacuations extended Wednesday into some Douglas County communities in Nevada. The major casinos in Stateline have closed their floors to gamblers, but have remained open for fire personnel to use as operational bases.
Some evacuation orders on the western end of the fire, among the first issued for the blaze in mid-August, were reduced to warnings Wednesday. Residents north of Highway 50 in the Pollock Pines, Cedar Grove and Camino areas can start to return home, Cal Fire and El Dorado County sheriff’s officials said.
Homes and businesses south of Highway 50 in those areas remain under evacuation orders.
The Caldor Fire continues to threaten more than 33,000 structures, Cal Fire and the U.S. Forest Service said in a Thursday morning update. Nearly 4,500 firefighters are assigned to the blaze, many of them working to bolster containment lines and protect homes in the basin.
There has also been heavy activity to the south along Highway 88, near the Kirkwood Mountain Resort.
Helicopters performed night water-dropping operations near Kirkwood late Wednesday, Cal Fire operations chief Tim Ernst said in a Thursday morning briefing.
Major Tahoe-area resorts including Kirkwood, Heavenly and Sierra-at-Tahoe have used their snow-making guns to wet their slopes in hopes of protecting against the fires.
“The fire right now is sort of bumping the border here of (the) Heavenly Valley ski area, but a lot of good work has gone in right along this northern perimeter of the fire ... to protect all these housing developments” just south of South Lake Tahoe, Ernst said.
More evacuations reduced on west side
El Dorado County sheriff’s officials at 10 a.m. Wednesday downgraded several more mandatory evacuation orders to warnings, and dropped other warnings entirely, near the fire’s origin point southwest of Pollock Pines.
Much of the Omo Ranch community can begin to repopulate, including along Omo Ranch Road.
Cal Fire officials in briefings this week have said containment lines have held up very well on the western side of the fire, and the gusty winds from earlier this week did not increase fire activity in that direction.
Fire passes 210,000 acres
The Caldor Fire has chewed through 210,259 acres (329 square miles), Cal Fire and the Forest Service said in their Thursday update, making it the 15th-largest wildfire in California’s recorded history. It is 25% contained.
The fire ignited Aug. 14 south of Pollock Pines. It exploded to life in the first few days, raging through the town of Grizzly Flats and spreading northeast toward Highway 50. A nearly 50-mile stretch of the highway, from Pollock Pines to Meyers, remains closed in both directions.
Cal Fire said in Thursday’s update that 622 homes have been confirmed destroyed, but that the damage assessment is only about 60% complete. Much of that destruction came in Grizzly Flats, where two civilians were also airlifted to hospitals with serious injuries, authorities said previously.
Biden declares emergency for Caldor Fire
President Joe Biden on Wednesday evening declared an emergency and ordered federal assistance for the Caldor Fire, a few hours after Gov. Gavin Newsom’s request for those declarations.
That includes the authorization of a Federal Emergency Management Agency grant to reimburse state and local emergency response costs with federal funds.
This story was originally published September 2, 2021 at 7:48 AM with the headline "Winds calm down near South Lake Tahoe as Caldor Fire passes 210,000 acres."
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