Remote location, difficult conditions providing challenges for firefighters battling Lake Fire

SANTA BARBARA COUNTY, Calif. - As the Lake Fire burns for a fifth straight day, firefighters are facing a handful of difficult circumstances in their ongoing effort to get the large blaze under control.

As of Tuesday morning, the Lake Fire has burned a total of 26,176 acres, with 12% containment and more than 2,400 personnel who are assigned to the incident.

"Right now, crews are working diligently out on the fire line," said Jason Wingard, California Interagency Incident Management Team 13. "We have nine divisions set in place with five branches. We have the night operations, as well as two divisions out there. We do have contingency groups set up as well. We have three contingencies for anticipated fire growth."

The fire, which is currently the largest one burning in the state, is located deep within the rugged backcountry of the Los Padres National Forest in Santa Barbara County, presenting fire crews with many challenges.

"Where the fire is burning with the topography, it's a lot of steep, narrow drainages," said Wingard. "There's a lot of box canyons, steep slopes. The access is tough getting out there on the dirt roads. They rocky, dirt and sandy roads. It's hard to get out in some of those areas, especially where it starts going out into the wilderness. There are some hiking trails and things like that, but however with it being wilderness, you have to use minimum suppression tactics and those things to keep it in check."

Another concern with the firefighting effort on Tuesday is a Red Flag Warning that is in effect, indicating strong winds are forecast to blow across the fire zone.

"We do have a Red Flag Warning today," said Wingard. "That's coming out of the northwest, so we are anticipating rapid fire growth to the southeast. That is a concern for us, so we are working on pre-plans for the anticipated fire growth towards the southeast, the south and east as well. We are in meetings with our partners and our cooperators and looking at evacuation areas in case the need happens or we need to start evacuating the public."

While parts of Santa Barbara County enjoyed a chilly evening with a thick layer of overcast moving across the coastal regions and into some inland areas through the night, the weather didn't cooperate in the fire area, where warms and dry conditions persisted all evening long and throughout the early morning hours.

"The marine layer is staying in the lower elevations," said Wingard. "Where the fire is burning, it's up in higher elevations, so it's above the marine layer. We're seeing hotter temperatures, lower relative humidity, and at night, we are seeing rapid fire growth at night. It's doing that because the temperatures are still sitting high and the RH (relative humidity) is staying low."