San Diego's stadium shelter due to close today

SAN DIEGO — The football stadium where thousands of displaced residents sought
refuge is closing as an evacuation center, symbolic progress against wildfires menacing
Southern California
Once sheltering more than 10,000 people, Qualcomm Stadium was home
to just 350 this morning. It was to close later in the day
Across San Diego County, the region hardest hit by the firestorms that began last weekend, thousands of
evacuees have been trickling back to neighborhoods stripped bare
The lucky ones will find their homes still standing amid a blackened landscape. Others, like Robert Sanders,
are not so fortunate.
The 56-year-old photographer returned to a smoldering mound that once was his rented house in the San Diego neighborhood of Rancho Bernardo.
Among the possessions he lost were his transparencies, melted inside a fire-resistant box, and a
photograph of his father “I’ve lost my history,” Sanders said. “All the work I’ve done
for the past 30 years, it’s all destroyed.”
Thousands of people lost their homes, and several fires continued burning out of control today.
One had crested Palomar Mountain and was threatening the landmark Palomar Observatory.
“I’m not sure how close it is, but evidently it’s close enough for us to be concerned about (the observatory) and the
radio towers on top,” said Fred Daskoski, a spokesman for the California Department of
Forestry and Fire Protection. He said crews were clearing brush from around the
observatory and lighting back burns to halt the fire’s advance. The observatory, operated
by Caltech, was home to the world’s largest telescope when it opened in 1908.
To the southeast, the Witch Fire, which already has destroyed more than 1,000 homes, was churning its way toward Julian. The town of 3,000, nestled in the rolling hills of a popular apple-growing region, was under mandatory evacuation.
Flames were about six miles away, and firefighters were concerned that west
winds would accelerate the blaze uphill toward the town.
East of San Diego, firefighters also were trying to keep flames from Lake Morena, which is surrounded by
hundreds of homes. Today’s flare-ups underscored the wildfires’ continuing threat,
even as crews were making rapid progress.
“Until you get a control line around each and every individual fire, there’s a potential of them blowing out anywhere,” Daskoski said.
In all, fires have raced across 490,000 acres — or 765 square miles.
Still unsettled is whether the San Diego Chargers will play their home game against the Houston Texans at Qualcomm on Sunday. Mayor Jerry Sanders said the stadium should be ready but indicated the decision will be made by the NFL and the team.
“The challenge now is starting to rebuild and getting them the resources they need to do that,” San Diego County
spokeswoman Lesley Kirk said today.
An Associated Press investigation revealed that nearly two dozen water-dropping helicopters
and two cargo planes were grounded by government rules and bureaucracy as flames
spread. The Navy, Marine and California National Guard helicopters were grounded for a
day partly because state rules require all firefighting choppers to be accompanied by state
forestry “fire spotters” who coordinate water or retardant drops. By the time those
spotters arrived, the high winds made flying too dangerous.
Additionally, the National Guard’s C-130 cargo planes were not part of the firefighting arsenal because long-standing retrofits have yet to be completed. The tanks they need to carry thousands of gallons of
fire retardant were promised four years ago.
“When you look at what’s happened, it’s disgusting, inexcusable foot-dragging that’s put tens of thousands of people in danger,” Republican U.S. Rep. Dana Rohrabacher said.