Sequoia Crews Brace For Wind

Firefighting officials at the 63,000-acre blaze in the Sequoia National Forest hope to continue major progress today toward containing California´s largest wildfire of the year. The blaze was declared 30% contained last night and again this morning. It grew about one-thousand-acres overnight. Firefighters´ major effort has been to create 80 miles of firebreaks to keep flames from spreading westward into eleven groves of some of the world´s largest and oldest trees. Winds were pushing the fire northeast yesterday toward a remote area including 70,000 acres that were burned only two years ago.

This afternoon winds from the northwest are expected to be up to 15 miles per hour, as nearly 1,700 firefighters work in temperatures from the mid-90´s to near 100. The cost of the firefighting effort since Sunday is approaching eight million dollars.