U.S.

Humidity Helps Arizona Fire Crews

July 15, 2003 / 9:21 AM EDT / CBS/AP

Evacuated residents were allowed to return to their homes after humid conditions dampened a wildfire burning about a half mile from an exclusive desert enclave.

Residents were given the all-clear late Monday, about 24 hours after they were first asked to flee as winds pushed the fire downhill into Ventana Canyon.

Fire officials said humidity ranging between 30 percent and 50 percent helped extinguish flames in some areas above the homes and calmed the fire in others by increasing the moisture level. Retardant dropped from the air Sunday night also helped tame flames.

Residents were urged to evacuate about 200 homes, and about 250 guests had to leave the Loews Ventana Canyon Resort, on Sunday. The resort was expected to reopen Tuesday.

Officials said the voluntary evacuations in the canyon on the fringes of the city had been requested in part so firefighters would be able to work without having to worry about residents being in the area.

Fire team spokesman Pete Davis noted fire retardant is dropped in 12,000-pound loads that could possibly endanger people. "It's risky to have people in the area that don't know what's going on," he said.

Deputy Steve Easton, a spokesman for the Pima County Sheriff's Department, said residents in about 20 homes agreed to leave, while other residents stayed behind.

Ventana Canyon is in the foothills of the towering Santa Catalina Mountains, where the fire has raged since June 17. It has blackened more than 81,000 acres.

The human-caused fire destroyed more than 300 homes last month in and around the mountaintop vacation hamlet of Summerhaven on Mount Lemmon. It skirted fire lines last week and burned a handful of cabins in the previously untouched mountaintop enclave of Willow Canyon.

But lines created by burnouts, clearing brush and thinning trees continued to hold Monday around dozens of other homes and cabins, several youth camps, an observatory owned by the University of Arizona and communications towers.

Jim Rothschild and his wife, Sandy, faced the threat of the wildfire twice. First, their cabin in Summerhaven was destroyed by the fire two weeks ago. Then, they were evacuated from their Ventana Canyon home as the fire approached Sunday.

As they returned to their remaining home, Jim Rothschild said he and his wife feel confident the worst is over.

"I wouldn't say 100 percent, but we feel relatively comfortable," he said.

In Oregon, about 30 families were ordered to evacuate as a 125-acre wildfire that spread quickly near the southern town of Williams; there were no injuries and no homes had burned.

Three helicopters are supporting the efforts of ground fire-fighting crews, and a fourth helicopter has been ordered. No injuries have thus far been reported. Marc Hollen, with the Northwest Interagency Coordination Center in Portland, tells CBS News about 100 homes and 100 outbuildings around Williams are threatened by the fire.

Another Oregon blaze, a 600-acre fire near Sisters, forced the evacuation of some campgrounds and was expected to be fully contained on Tuesday.

Other fires continued frustrating firefighters in the West:

Fire crews rode four houseboats and a state ferry across the mile-wide Columbia River to get at a 4,500-acre wildfire in a remote area of the Colville Indian Reservation in northeast Washington.

Another Washington blaze grew from 1,075 acres to 1,125 acres on the Spokane Indian Reservation, about 18 miles west of Wellpinit. Farther north, in the Pasayten Wilderness, three fires blackened about 1,680 acres.

High temperatures and winds pushed a wildfire within three miles of the Canon Heights neighborhood in the eastern foothills of Taos, N.M. The fire has burned 2,500 acres near the ancient Indian village of Taos Pueblo.

A pickup truck fire sparked a 120-acre blaze in Angeles National Forest in California's Los Angeles County. No structures were damaged and crews were mopping up the flames Monday.