Firefighters help each other

Firefighters from Laguna Beach spent nearly a week battling wildfires

some 60 miles away from their coverage area.

Although the fires raging in Los Angeles County weren’t a threat

to Laguna, local firefighters were called in to help.

It’s all part of a statewide mutual-aid agreement among California

fire agencies. Whether it is fighting a brush fire in the Inland

Empire or sifting through floodwaters for hurricane survivors in the

South, local firefighters give help wherever they are needed.

When an emergency overwhelms a city’s resources, backups are

called in, starting with nearby agencies, officials said.

Depending on the incident, resources can be pulled from agencies

within the region, state and, in some cases, across the country.

In California, mutual aid is used for all types of disaster

situations, said Laguna Beach Battalion Chief Jeff LaTendresse.

In daily emergencies, local agencies assist one another all the

time, LaTendresse said.

“No agency has enough resources to handle the major, major

incidents,” said Dave Mais, a battalion chief with the Newport Beach

Fire Department, which frequently responds to incidents in Laguna

Beach.

The city has an automatic aid agreement with the Newport Beach

Fire Department and the Orange County Fire Authority, LaTendresse

said.

A Fire Authority unit responded to an apartment blaze Monday in

the 200 block of Cliff Drive, LaTendresse said. Anytime there’s a

structure fire in Laguna, a unit from the Fire Authority is

automatically dispatched to help, LaTendresse said.

The fire was contained to one unit in the building and caused

$50,000 in damage. The cause is still under investigation, but it

appears to have been an accident, LaTendresse said. The tenant was

not home at the time of the fire and no one was injured.

Two engines from Laguna were dispatched to a fire in Los Angeles

County, one on Sept. 28, the other on Saturday, LaTendresse said. The

city sent three firefighters on each engine; the engines were part of

two separate regional strike teams dispatched to the fires.

The first engine to go was the city’s reserve fire engine, owned

by the state’s Office of Emergency Services, LaTendresse said.

That engine belongs to the state but is housed in Laguna. It is

called out to respond to incidents throughout the county, LaTendresse

said.

There are a total of 120 Emergency Services engines throughout the

state, with five in Orange County.

The second engine, which left Laguna early Saturday for the

Burbank fire, was the “wildland” engine, equipped to deal

specifically with wildfires in rough terrain.

The engine, a four-wheeldrive short truck with superior turning

radius, is designed to be driven off-road.

“We have one of those [engines] because there are many parts of

our city, or surrounding our city, in the wilderness area that we

can’t get access to,” LaTendresse said.

The strike team stays together until it is no longer needed at the

fire, officials said. The cities and counties have the capability to

communicate on one radio frequency during the emergency.

The deploying of resources comes at a time when the fire danger in

Laguna is at its peak -- but LaTendresse said that Laguna’s fire

department will remain fully staffed and ready to handle any

emergency that may happen at home.

“We still had four staffed engines and one more reserve engine

available to us,” LaTendresse said.

In Laguna Beach, the fire danger is significant in many spots

throughout the city.

“In our viewpoint, all areas are equally at risk,” LaTendresse

said.

Although the National Weather Service had not issued a red flag

fire warning to Orange County as of late Wednesday, LaTendresse said

the threat of local wildfires was still a possibility.

“Anything that comes from outside the city on a Santa Ana wind day

could be very problematic for us,” LaTendresse said.

When the engines left for Los Angeles County, the fire department

brought in replacement firefighters to cover the loss. Due to inland

fires, the department actually increased staffing at all four fire

stations over the weekend, LaTendresse said.