Fire threatens giant

PINE FLAT, Calif. -- A ferocious wildfire fed by dense underbrush and weeks of dry weather roared toward treasured groves of giant sequoias whose ages are measured in centuries.\nThe 48,200-acre blaze moved through the valleys of the Giant Sequoia National Monument and came within a few miles of the Freeman Creek Grove and Trail of 100 Giants.\nThe fire was expanding in three directions Wednesday, and the main concern was that southeasterly wind might push it closer to groves of giant sequoias, firefighters and forestry officials said. The flames were generally moving away from towns in the region.\nMore than 1,000 firefighters were assigned to the blaze.\n"If fire does get in the Trail of 100 Giants, we won't be putting firefighters in there to try to stop it. It will be a climax of 300- or 400-foot flames," Jim Paxon, spokesman for a national team of elite firefighters called in to manage the blaze, said Tuesday.\nThe trail includes 125 giant sequoias over 10 feet in diameter, and more than 143 sequoias under 10 feet in diameter. The trees are 500 to 1,500 years old.\nMore than 1,000 people have fled and at least 10 structures have burned. Among those evacuated were several hundred Boy Scouts, campers and residents of two hamlets, Johnsondale and Ponderosa.\nThe fire comes in the middle of one of the worst fire seasons in recent memory. A grueling drought has created hot spots across the West, with devastating fires popping up in California, Arizona, Washington, Colorado and Oregon.\nThe California fire was only 20 percent contained Tuesday. And because the monument's deep canyons and mountain ridges make for erratic wind, it was hard to predict where the fire would go.\nThe U.S. Forest Service said it wanted to interview a middle-aged woman who apparently walked into a store and said she had started the blaze after abandoning her campfire.\nAnti-logging activists and forestry officials have clashed over how best to take care of the sequoias. Environmentalists have blocked efforts to thin underbrush in the forest, calling it a front for logging.\nBut forest officials warn that simply letting the forest grow without check makes the trees easy prey for the very kind of fire currently raging.\nThe forest service has done some controlled burns and machine thinning of brush and smaller trees in the forest, but has been hampered by lawsuits and lack of a management plan.\n"The last couple years that the monument has been in place, it's been kind of 'hands off,'" in terms of fire preparation, said Kent Duysen, general manager a sawmill in Terra Bella.\nThe fire began Sunday in Johnsondale, a hamlet about 130 miles north of Los Angeles, and quickly blew out of control.\nSaving the biggest trees was a top priority, U.S. Forest Service spokesman Matt Mathes said. He called the sequoias "priceless" and said resources were not being spared to protect them.