Henderson Fire reaches 3,132 acres on Saturday, October 17, and holds at 20 percent containment
Cal Fire's 6:35 a.m. update added more than a thousand acres to the Camp Pendleton fire's mapped footprint overnight, while containment stayed at the 20 percent crews first reached on Friday evening. Interstate 5 stayed open on Saturday morning.
CAMP PENDLETON: The Henderson Fire grew to 3,132 acres by Saturday morning, October 17, Cal Fire said in a 6:35 a.m. update, up from the 2,080 acres mapped at midday Friday. Containment held at 20 percent, the figure crews first reached on Friday evening after a day in which the fire had no containment at all.
The New York Post's Saturday morning roundup of the Southern California fires put the Henderson Fire at more than 3,100 acres with 20 percent containment, one of four wildfires burning across the region on Saturday.
The freeway stays open
Cal Fire's Saturday morning update carried no new Interstate 5 closure. The freeway reopened in both directions on Friday at 5:14 p.m., according to the California Highway Patrol updates posted on the incident page, after the second full closure in two days. Earlier on Friday the fire crossed its containment lines on the northwest side of the base, and smoke and flames on both sides of the freeway forced the shutdown between Vandergrift Boulevard and Basilone Road.
Crews also handled a second blaze on Friday. The Scales Fire ignited along Interstate 5 near the San Onofre checkpoint, in the same general area as the Henderson Fire, and firefighters stopped its spread at approximately 20 acres. The San Diego County Incident Management Team was assigned on Friday to support the Henderson Fire, adding leadership and coordination across command, operations, planning, logistics and finance.
Another day of fire weather
Firefighters planned to continue building containment lines, extinguishing hot spots and addressing hazards as suppression efforts continued, Cal Fire said. The National Weather Service kept a heat advisory on the San Diego County coast and a high wind warning over the county's inland valleys until 8 p.m. Saturday, the third day of the Santa Ana event that drove the fire's run west toward the freeway.
The fire started on Thursday afternoon near Henderson Street and Brown Street. The Camp Pendleton Fire Department holds jurisdiction over it, supported by Cal Fire and other agencies, and its cause is under investigation. No injuries and no destroyed structures had been reported through Friday.
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