Fire crews get handle on brush fire above Gaviota State Park trailhead

–UPDATE–

Firefighters have stopped the fire’s forward progress and will remain on scene for at least three hours for mop-up operations.

Santa Barbara County fire crews are responding to a brush fire burning above Gaviota State Beach.

The call went out about 1:15 p.m. Friday afternoon.

According to the CHP website, a plume of blue/grey smoke could be seen up the hillside in the area where U.S. Highway 101 and Highway 1 meet.

The targeted area is Gaviota Fire Peak Road., roughly one mile up from the mountain trailhead.

Emergency scanner traffic indicates the fire is roughly 2-3 acres in size with a moderate rate of spread in heavy fuel, and has the potential to grow to 100 acres.

Some of the fuel was stressed from multiple years of drought.

Two planes and a helicopter were called out to douse the flames with both the fire retardant phos check and water drawn from a source by the Alisal Ranch.

That was a help to ground crews coming in from Santa Barbara County Fire, the Los Padres National Forest and Cal Fire.

The cause of the fire is under investigation.

The area did not have power lines where the fire broke out.