County strike team battling 'extreme' fire

Steep terrain and flames that were shooting 200 feet into the air were hampering the efforts to control the fire burning out of control near Yosemite National Park.

"It is very steep, there are lots of brush and it is getting into the upper elevations, where there are trees," said Dan George, the assistant fire chief for Gold Ridge, on site from Sonoma County.

George is leading a strike team of 20 men and five engines from Gold Ridge, Bennett Valley, Forestville, Rancho Adobe and Rincon Valley fire departments that arrived in Mariposa on Saturday.

"There is extreme terrain and extreme fire behavior, some of that stuff is coming off with 100-foot, 200-foot flame lengths," George said by phone Tuesday.

Firefighters were working to contain the wildfire raging outside Yosemite National Park, and shut a major highway into the wilderness Tuesday, keeping travelers far from the park's western gate.

Yosemite remained open. But a 10-mile stretch of Highway 140 remained closed throughout the day. That's where many of the Sonoma and Mendocino firefighters were located.

George said his team on Tuesday was working along Highway 140 north of Mariposa, patrolling the fire perimeter and trying to keep it from jumping the highway.

"It is burning pretty good. They are getting a handle on the south end, toward Mariposa. They are trying to keep it west of 140, trying to keep it out of Yosemite," George said.

"We are working in on the northeast corner of fire.

The blaze had destroyed 25 homes, and forced the evacuation of 300 others in the Sierra Nevada foothill towns of Midpines and Coulterville.