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| California firefighters race to take advantage of cool, damp weather
LOS ANGELES, Nov 1 (AFP) - Firefighters in ravaged southern California raced Saturday to take advantage of cool, damp weather to fight blazes that have killed 22 people and driven more than 100,000 from their homes. Recent wet weather was a welcome relief from the hot, dry desert winds that earlier fanned the blazes, but officials were reserved. Adaptive intelligence for a serious advantage: business, investment and technology- BizVantage! "There's a great air of optimism," Gene Zimmerman, US Forest Service supervisor for the San Bernardino National Forest told the Los Angeles Times. "We're not out of the woods, but the tide is turning and hopefully it continues to." Tens of thousands more residents were forced to flee their homes Friday as the most active of the state's 17 fires threatened the upmarket ski resort area of Big Bear, east of Los Angeles. "It looks like a ghost town, there's no sign of movement," said outgoing California Governor Gray Davis, who Friday surveyed the region by helicopter and later made an extraordinary appearance with his successor, movie star and governor-elet Arnold Schwarzenegger, to open a new relief center east of Los Angeles. The Big Bear area was evacuated as firefighters battled to hold back flames ripping through thousands of hectares (acres) of tinder-dry trees, dead from years of drought and insect infestation. Cold winds and moisture-filled clouds meanwhile displaced the deadly Santa Ana desert winds that had driven the fires which erupted 11 days ago. "We are cautiously optimistic because of the change in weather as it looks like we may have a little relief in the future," said Patti Roberts of the governor's Office of Emergency Management. But while the shift from "devil winds" to rain -- and even snow predicted for higher elevations in the coming days -- was helping the battle by slowing the advance of the flames, it will not be enough to win the war. "It will take another week to contain them fully and three to four weeks to bring them fully under control," said Bob Martinez of the firefighters' Southern Operations Information Center. "The fight goes on." "The weather conditions are good for knocking down the fire but not so good for the work of the firemen now facing other problems such as cold temperatures, mudslides in more roads, trees falling onto the road, mud slides falling onto the road, that is impeding our progress," said the Forest Service's Gerry Snider. US President George W. Bush plans to travel to California Tuesday to view the fire damage and to receive an update on efforts to help the people of California, a White House spokesman announced Friday. More than 14,500 firefighters are battling the infernos that have so far ravaged 3,000 square kilometers (1,200 square miles) of southern California, obliterating 3,338 homes. Davis said the cost of the disaster had been "conservatively" estimated at more than two billion dollars, including firefighting, damage to infrastructure, rebuilding and the toll on the insurance industry. The fires have devoured a 300,027-hectare (750,689-acre) swath of the state, from the Mexican border to north of Los Angeles, officials said. Leaping up mountainsides and through valleys, they have overrun entire towns, killing 22 people -- 20 in California and two in Mexico after the flames jumped the border. And officials warned the death toll was likely to rise as investigators gain access to more devastated areas. One fire on Friday was about 16 kilometers (10 miles) from Big Bear and firefighters were building massive fire breaks to halt its advance. At least 105,000 people have been forced from their homes by fires that have charred 64,415 hectares (161,000 acres) in San Bernardino, 160,000 hectares (400,000 acres) around San Diego and 43,300 hectares (107,590 acres) in the suburban Los Angeles area of Simi Valley. bur/kd-mdl/aln US-fire
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