Around 400 people, including 130 special needs children, were evacuated early Saturday from campgrounds in the Angeles National Forest in the face of a fast-moving wildfire.
Another five campgrounds in the Wrightwood area were to be evacuated this morning, the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department said.
The wildfire, known as the Pine Fire, was reported at 9:25 p.m. Friday on the 24500 block of North Angeles Crest Highway, and was burning in steep, heavily timbered terrain on the eastern border of Los Angeles County in the San Gabriel Mountains.
At last report, it had burned 125 acres by 12:30 a.m. today.
An Angeles National Forest spokeswoman said a clearer estimate of the size of the fire would be available after 6 a.m.
The special needs children, most of them deaf or hearing-impaired, were taken off the mountain in Sheriff’s vans and prison buses to a high school in the San Bernardino city of Phelan.
About 90 Girl Scouts self-evacuated from another campground, Deputy Trina Schrader said.
The same location, Serrano High School, was being used to house evacuees from the North Fire that swept Interstate 15 at Cajon Pass earlier Friday.
The blaze was being fought by 150 firefighters, with sheriff’s units from Lancaster, Santa Clarita Valley, Temple City, San Dimas, Walnut and Industry stations, Deputy Tina Schrader said.
— City News Service