Rain fell Wednesday across the sprawling Lake County fire zone, bringing more moisture than expected by fire officials who vowed that nature’s gift would be used against the five-day-old 70,200-acre blaze.
“It’s exactly what we want,” Cal Fire spokesman Paul Lowenthal said.
Lowenthal said the rain - almost half an inch in Lakeport by 4 p.m. - would tamp down the fire to a creep Wednesday instead of the rampage it had been on under sunny skies with a push from the wind. Containment lines, which were set around about one-third of the three-county, 105-square-mile fire, were expected to grow significantly as an army of firefighters worked into the wet night.
“It’s important for us to do everything we can today and hit hard with everything we have,” he said.
As firefighting efforts ramped up, Lake County sheriff’s officials launched a search, aided by cadaver dogs, for fire victims in areas scorched by the blaze that erupted Saturday near Cobb. No bodies were found. They also arrested four people suspected of intending to loot in the fire zone.
Starting today the weather gets dry and warm, with temperatures this weekend expected soar back into the 90s, quickly drying the brush and grass and returning the advantage to the fire.
But Wednesday’s weather favored firefighters and fire officials redoubled their efforts.
Hundreds more firefighters had poured into base camp during the night, bringing the attack force to 3,100.
Wednesday’s rainfall lasted for hours, ranging from downpours in Middletown and the mountainous Cobb area to a steady rain in Lakeport, where scores of fire officials were managing the blaze.
Lowenthal, stationed at the Lakeport fire headquarters, said the change in weather had reduced operations maps taped to the side of trailers to tie-dyed pictures as the ink ran. It was an image far removed from those produced at the start of the fire, an inferno that sped through miles of southern Lake County, from Cobb Mountain to Hidden Valley Lake, southeast into unoccupied rugged terrain of Napa County and west into the geothermal fields above northern Sonoma County.
As helpful as it was in Wednesday’s firefighting efforts, the rainfall also had a down side, Lowenthal said.
It was turning the ash permeating the region to a sticky, muddy mess that posed safety issues for firefighters and difficulties for equipment negotiating soppy ground and slick roadways.
It also produced a flurry of phone calls from many of the 15,800 evacuees who wanted to know if they could go return home. “They think now they can go home because it’s raining,” Lowenthal said. “Hopefully this will help control it a lot quicker, but we’re not there yet. There’s a lot of work to be done.”
Downed power lines - which aren’t currently active - are everywhere and utility crews will need to use the narrow rural roadways to get repairs done without worrying about residents coming and going, he said.
Fire-weakened trees - now more likely to topple in wet soil - are another hazard.
As of Wednesday evening the 35 percent containment lines were mainly along Highway 29 north of Hidden Valley Lake to south of Sieglar Canyon Road. A small chunk of line also was completed at The Geysers.
The rest of the fire, however, was uncontrolled and still growing, after gaining 2,800 acres overnight from Tuesday.
Law enforcement officers with dogs trained to look for dead people were searching Wednesday afternoon in the Cobb Mountain area and Middletown, Lake County Sheriff Brian Martin said.
Deputies are investigating three cases involving four missing people in those two general areas, Martin said. The sheriff gave limited details and declined to say where in those areas the searches were occurring. He did say the missing people are a couple - a man and a woman - and two individual men.
Martin said he didn’t know the circumstances, including whether the people may have been trapped in their homes or if they couldn’t get out of an area before the fire arrived.
Meanwhile, Cal Fire spokeswoman Amy Head said she understood investigators were “making some good progress” on determining the cause of the fire.
Residents of High Valley Road, about a half-mile from Bottle Rock Road in Cobb, have said they saw the fire start in and around a grass field near a home that was unoccupied on Saturday afternoon. They said the flames were driven quickly out of control and expanded from their neighborhood on the northern flank of Cobb Mountain uphill toward the south and beyond.
But while investigators have cordoned off the house and yard at issue, Cal Fire officials - as is routine - have not divulged any information about the their findings.
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