Evacuation orders lifted as firefighters make progress on Canyon fire

Firefighters are continuing to make progress battling a wildfire burning in the hills near the Los Angeles and Ventura county line, allowing thousands of evacuated residents to return to their homes Friday evening as public health officials warned of potentially unhealthy air in the area through the weekend.

By 6 p.m. Friday, crews had reached 28% containment on the 5,370-acre Canyon fire burning near Castaic, which broke out amid a heat wave Thursday and has destroyed at least two buildings and injured three firefighters, according to the L.A. County Fire Department.

Evacuation orders affecting around 2,700 residents have been downgraded to warnings, while evacuation warnings affecting around 14,000 residents have been lifted, according to Ventura County Fire Department spokesperson Andrew Dowd.

“We’ve made tremendous progress on this fire; we are very proud of the hard work that has been done by the men and women on the ground,” Dowd said. “I think residents in the area can be thankful for the firefighters that came here to help serve them.”

At 6:20 p.m., a single vehicle rolled over at the scene of the fire and one person was taken to a hospital for treatment, Dowd said. The Ventura County Fire Department is investigating the circumstances surrounding the incident and did not say whether the person injured was a firefighter.

According to the South Coast Air Quality Management District, smoke from the Canyon fire is causing unhealthy air quality in Los Angeles County, primarily in the 5 Freeway corridor near Castaic Lake. The L.A. County Department of Public Health has issued a smoke advisory until 11 a.m. Sunday, and is urging everyone in areas where they can see or smell smoke to limit or avoid outdoor activity.

Ventura County officials said the fire ignited just before 2 p.m. Thursday — when temperatures were peaking at around 100 degrees — northeast of Piru, a small, unincorporated town not far from Castaic Junction. It then charged east, threatening homes and temporarily prompting evacuation orders in the L.A. County communities of Val Verde, Hasley Canyon and Castaic.

Taking advantage of cooler temperatures Thursday night into Friday morning, crews were able to make inroads against the fast-moving blaze that grew to several thousand acres in a matter of hours, Dowd said. But he said the fight ahead remains challenging, given the hot weather, rugged terrain and a parched landscape that, together, can foster extreme fire growth.

“We are seeing some flare-ups in various parts of the fire,” Dowd said Friday morning. “We still have record-low fuel moisture in the area, so we’re not letting our guard” down.

Two small structures, probably sheds or outbuildings, have been confirmed destroyed, Dowd said. Officials have not confirmed any homes or businesses damaged, but video from the scene showed a few buildings destroyed or engulfed in flames. It wasn’t immediately clear if that was additional damage from the two small buildings.

Dowd said he expects containment to grow over Friday night as firefighters double down on the work that’s been done so far — “so that’s patrolling, mopping up, reinforcing containment lines, addressing hot spots and flareups as they occur, and continuing to provide structure defense and structure protection to those properties that may be at risk.”

Residents in the Val Verde area said flames were visible from the neighborhood’s western edge Thursday, but the threat appeared to have calmed a bit by Friday morning, though the air remained thick with soot and ash.

“There’s a lot of smoke. The air is really, really bad,” Jennifer Elkins, president of the Val Verde Civic Assn., said Friday. Her neighborhood was under an evacuation order Thursday afternoon, but was able to return home Friday.

“We’re just kind of staying locked up indoors and keeping an eye on things,” Elkins said. “This is a really tough fire season, and I’m really glad the Fire Department is really taking every fire seriously. … This is a pretty big threat to the community.”

The Canyon fire quickly became one of the largest of several fires sparked during days of intense heat in Southern California. To the north in Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo counties, the much larger Gifford fire has burned more than 100,000 acres.

Unfortunately for firefighters on the ground, the heat is expected to persist into the weekend, though temperatures may drop a degree or two.

Temperatures were forecast to peak Friday at 98 degrees around the Canyon fire, and that heat plus the winds, low humidity and parched landscape would continue to create elevated fire conditions through the weekend, said Mike Wofford, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Oxnard.

“It’s ripe for fires and fire spread,” Wofford said.

A hand crew battles flames from the Canyon fire in Castaic.

(Eric Thayer / Getty Images)

“Although a few degrees of cooling is expected through the weekend, a very warm air mass will remain in place. An onshore flow regime will keep temperatures from exceeding record levels, but temperatures are expected to remain above seasonal normals as high pressure aloft lingers over the southwestern United States,” the weather service said in a Friday morning forecast.

The fire was initially reported to be about 30 acres, but within about two hours that estimate jumped to over 1,000 acres, according to Ventura County officials. By midnight, it had spread across 4,856 acres and was racing east toward Castaic and the 5 Freeway in L.A. County. On Friday, it grew another 514 acres.

More than 400 firefighters were assigned to the incident, according to fire officials.

A resident sprays down his home as firefighters prepare to battle flames from the Canyon fire in Castaic.

(Eric Thayer / Getty Images)

The American Civil Liberties Union raised concerns about the fire’s proximity to the Pitchess Detention Center, where about 5,000 inmates are housed in four jails. The center is east of the 5 Freeway and fell just outside an evacuation warning zone the first night of the fire.

Senior staff attorney Melissa Camacho said she was “gravely concerned” about the growing fire.

“January’s Hughes fire burned within a half-mile of the jails and not a single person incarcerated there was evacuated,” Camacho told The Times. “It’s heartbreaking that, less than eight months later, the 5,000 people in the jails and their loved ones will spend another sleepless night watching a fire and praying that it doesn’t reach them.”

The L.A. County Sheriff’s Department, which operates the facility, said it was actively monitoring fire conditions and was in constant communication with fire and county officials.

“Similar to evacuation plans implemented at Pepperdine University in Malibu, the Fire Department has advised that a shelter-in-place strategy is the safest option for custody staff and inmates, given the building construction type and current fire behavior,” agency spokesperson Nicole Nishida said in a statement. The area around the building has been cleared of brush and has wide defensible space, she said.

Gov. Gavin Newsom on Friday announced that the state had secured Federal Emergency Management Agency support to help pay for the fight against the blaze. The Fire Management Assistance Grant can provide federal funding for up to 75% of eligible firefighting costs, including expenses for field camps, equipment use, supplies and mobilization, and demobilization activities, according to FEMA.