Easy fire live updates: Evacuations ordered in Simi Valley

A large brush fire erupted in Simi Valley early Wednesday and quickly burned toward neighborhoods, sending thousands fleeing from their homes before dawn amid strong Santa Ana winds.

The Easy fire, which started near Easy Street and Madera Road shortly after 6 a.m., quickly burned toward Tierra Rejada Road, leaped across the street and made a run toward the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, said Ventura County Fire Chief Mark Lorenzen.

“Unfortunately it was about the worst time it could happen — 40-mile-an-hour sustained winds and fuels that were ripe and ready to carry fire,” he said.

Thick smoke choked the hillside where the 125,000-square-foot library — a repository of records and artifacts from the Reagan administration — is perched amid dense brush. Flames burned on all sides, but the library has not sustained damage, officials said.

The blaze, which has chewed through 1,300 acres of dense, dry brush, is burning west toward Highway 23 and east toward homes along Madera Road. At least one home on Tierra Rejada was damaged and 7,000 others are threatened.

About 26,000 residents in portions of Simi Valley, Moorpark and Thousand Oaks have been evacuated. The mandatory evacuation zone is bounded by Highway 23 to the west, Tierra Rejada Road to the north, Madera Road to the east, and Olsen Road and Sunset Hills Boulevard to the south. A voluntary evacuation area is bounded by Highway 23, Moorpark Road, Olsen Road and Read Road.

“Be ready and prepared,” Lorenzen said. “When we ask you to leave, please leave immediately.”

The efforts of 800 firefighters, eight air tankers and nine helicopters trying to get control of the fast-moving blaze were stymied through the morning by extreme wind conditions.

The fire quickly outflanked crews as winds gusting up to 65 mph picked up embers and carried them through the air. Wind-driven embers have been known to blow miles ahead of the front line of a blaze, setting spot fires and igniting homes. For that reason, officials cautioned people near the evacuation zones to keep their doors and windows closed.

Tanker aircraft dropping water and fire retardant were forced to divert from the area periodically because of turbulence, officials said.

“The [conditions for] air assets are challenging at best,” Ventura County Fire Capt. Steve Kaufmann said. “You can see a lot of the water that’s coming from the super-scoopers is atomized because of the wind. It’s definitely makes it challenging for us.”

Firefighters will focus their efforts through the afternoon on trying to prevent the blaze from jumping the 23 Freeway into the Sunset Hills community in Thousand Oaks, said Ventura County Assistant Fire Chief Chad Cook.

Cook said significant manpower was devoted to areas near the Reagan Library through the morning to protect the landmark. Helicopters repeatedly dropped loads of water behind the library amid 60-mph winds, turning the flames into smoke on a ridge 300 feet below. As wind gusts blew strong enough to knock a person off balance, two super-scooper planes dipped down behind the library, unleashing a large volume of water that created its own rainbow.

(Chris Keller / Los Angeles Times)

With fire sweeping down the ridge toward Roosevelt Court, an off-duty LAPD officer began yelling, alerting residents that the blaze was headed down the hill. Tensions immediately heightened as the flames became visible to homeowners.

Rory Kaplan has lived on Roosevelt since the homes were built there in 2001.

“I got the reverse 911 about 6:30 a.m.,” he said. “I pulled the cars out into the driveway, put the passports and bank documents in one and my musical instruments in the other car. I am ready to go.”

Simi Valley police began directing everyone via loudspeaker to leave the neighborhood behind the Reagan Library. Kaplan joined the exodus.

“One thing is sure,” he said. “They aren’t going to let Reagan’s library burn — and that protects us.”

Just south of Madera Road, a group of neighbors stood in an intersection in the Village on the Green neighborhood in the Wood Ranch area, watching the fire crawl down nearby hillsides and waiting to see whether they would be evacuated.

Helicopters flew close overhead, the sound of their engines echoing as they dumped load after load of water on the blaze. The wind ebbed and flowed through the neighborhood, shooting cold air past the group.

“I’m not so nervous, but my wife is,” Erik Roodman, 54, said as he watched the action. “She already has a bag packed. I just made sure I had clean clothes on in case I need to go.”

Hours earlier, thousands of residents fled their homes as wind-whipped flames rapidly consumed large swaths of brush, casting hillsides in an orange glow.

All Simi Valley public schools were closed because of the fire, and a shelter has been set up at the Thousand Oaks Community Center at 2525 N. Moorpark Road.

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Kris Mae, 69, was one of the first people to arrive at the community center Wednesday morning. Mae, an early riser, had been watching television on mute and listening to the radio when she heard the announcer say there was a fire near the Reagan Library — about four miles from her house. Outside, she saw a beige-and-red-hued plume of smoke.

“I’m right in the path,” she said. “That’s why I left my house, because it was so close.”

But she was prepared. She had packed her car with several suitcases, boxes of important files and a fire safe about a month ago when the first major fires of the season started.

“It’s too hard to pack and unpack over and over,” she said. “I’m a very nervous person when I get shaken.”

Chandler Collins, 23, was jolted awake early Wednesday by the sound of his grandmother banging on his door. They had to evacuate.

It was still dark outside, but he could see flames licking uphill near their home, which is on the same road as the Reagan Library. He threw together some clothing, pet supplies for his cat, Shadow, and his chinchilla, Rocket, plus his Halloween costume, in case he couldn’t make it back home before his dress-up day at work Thursday.

“I’ve never done this before, but it’s probably going to happen more often,” he said of the evacuations.

The Easy fire was one of several blazes that broke out across Southern California on Wednesday.

A fire in the Riverside County town of Nuevo began shortly after 7 a.m., burning several structures. Hours later, the Hill fire in the Jurupa Valley community of Riverside County prompted mandatory evacuations and closed the 60 Freeway in both directions. The Brea Canyon fire in eastern Los Angeles County burned five acres at Brea Canyon Road and briefly forced closure of the 57 Freeway.

The new fires come amid dangerous weather conditions and the threat of more intentional power blackouts as utility companies attempt to reduce wildfire risk.

In the area of the Easy fire, gusts of about 30 mph from the northeast were reported nearby around 8 a.m., National Weather Service meteorologist Lisa Phillips said.

By midday Wednesday, Southern California was facing peak fire weather, with winds of up to 78 mph at Boney Peak in the Santa Monica Mountains in Ventura County, while relative humidity fell to rock bottom, clocking at zero at Mt. Wilson in the San Gabriel Mountains and peaks in the Santa Ynez Mountains and the Los Padres National Forest, Phillips said.

The air was exceedingly dry throughout Ventura County. Relative humidity was 8% at Sinaloa Lake and 7% in Moorpark.

Forecasters said the winds would be the strongest to hit the region in recent memory and are expected to continue through Thursday.

Brent Lamb prepares to help move horses at a ranch along Tierra Rejada Road as the Easy fire burns Wednesday morning.

(AL Seib / Los Angeles Times )

“The magnitude of the wind gusts really is going to be a concern,” said Daniel Swain, climate scientist with UCLA and the National Center for Atmospheric Research. “The actual winds that people experience really will be quite extreme in a lot of places, really everywhere except for the wind-sheltered parts of downtown L.A. and central L.A.”

The forecast of extreme Santa Ana winds prompted Southern California Edison to say it might shut off power to more than 340,000 customers in Los Angeles, Ventura, Santa Barbara, San Bernardino and Riverside counties.

To the north, Pacific Gas & Electric Co. said Wednesday it would begin restoring power to customers who were shut off this week in its latest bid to reduce wildfire risk. Crews will inspect utility lines, repair damage and restore power to about 365,000 customers in its service area, except for Kern County, which is still experiencing strong winds, according to PG&E.

Fire danger from power lines was underscored Tuesday when L.A. officials said a Los Angeles Department of Water and Power line hit by a tree branch sparked the Getty fire.

Times staff writer Rong-Gong Lin II and Alejandra Reyes-Velarde contributed to this report.