Cal Fire issued mandatory evacuation orders Sunday night for many people who live south of Lake Tahoe in El Dorado and Alpine counties due to the Caldor Fire.
Officials also issued evacuation warnings for others in parts of both counties, as well as further north in Lassen County due to the Dixie Fire.
The orders to evacuate are for residents the following areas:
- El Dorado County: in the Desolation Wilderness from the watershed ridge to the wilderness boundary, and from the El Dorado/Placer county line to Echo Lakes.
- Alpine County: State Route 89 south, from Luther Pass Road to Picketts Junction (State Route 88), and west on State Route 88 to Kirkwood, and south including Kirkwood ski resort and Caples Lake.
Cal Fire has provided an interactive evacuation map at this link.
Evacuation warnings are also in effect for Camp Concord, which is located in S. Lake Tahoe, and areas of El Dorado, Alpine and Lassen counties.
Cal Fire defines a warning as a potential threat to life and/or property. Those who require additional time to evacuate and those with pets and livestock should leave now.
The warning is in effect in El Dorado County for the remaining area of the Lake Tahoe Basin, from the Alpine/El Dorado county line north along the state border to Lake Tahoe, north along the lake to the El Dorado/Placer county line and west along the El Dorado/Placer county line to McKinney Lake.
The warning is in effect in Alpine County from State Route 88 at Forestdale Road west and south to the Pacific Crest Trail crossing, west to the Summit City Canyon Trail, west from there to the El Dorado/Stanislaus National Forest line and west from there to the Alpine/Amador county line. In addition, the warning includes the area south of the Armstrong Summit to Woodfords to Forestdale Road and north of State Route 88 and State Route 89 to the Armstrong Summit.
In Lassen County, the warning is in effect from the Bogard area north of State Route 44 from Pittville Road east to County Road A21 and north to Blacks Mountain, and Harvey Mountain and south of Ashurst Lake, as well as west of County Road A1 from the intersection of County Road A21 north to Forest Services Route 32NO2.
I have heard several fire captains say they are doing their best for the equipment they have. When the fire jumped hiway 50 the 747s they don’t have could have painted the mountains between 50 and south lake Tahoe red. That would have made the fire manageable from the ground. I think our politicians would rather have a global warming argument.
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Why isn’t Governor Newsom directing more resources to fight these wildfires?
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The world wonders.
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He is derelict in his duties as the alleged leader of CA.
There are no more fire crews available. All of the crews trained for terrain fires are out fighting the Caldor and Dixie already. What is he suppose to do? Are YOU willing to fight the fire?
Geez go find a fire fighter and talk to them. It’s not like you can send just anyone in to fight a terrain fire. You can’t bring crews in from Kansas or Nebraska to fight these fires as they have ZERO mountain terrain training. There are no crews to send in from Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Colorado, Montana, Wyoming, or British Columbia as they are home fighting their own fires. Mutual aid is exhausted.
You can thank the Sierra Club and their endless lawsuits against the Feds (yes these forests are part of the US Dept of Forestry and not the state) for the lack of thinning. And when the investigation is complete it will come down to either PG&E or a stupid human thar started this thing and most of the others.
Maybe because CalFire isn’t in charge?
US Forest service (US Fire) is running the show.
Currently there are over 7500 Fire-fighting personnel on the Dixie and Caldor fires, Also there are hundreds of police, CHP, and medical response personnel from all over California helping out. Not to mention hundreds of pieces of road equipment, helicopters and small planes staged nearby. You can visit inciweb.com for more information.
Try and keep up, please. Spreading misinformation isn’t helping us up here.
CoCoOld
They have sent every engine company except on from Carson City early this morning and they are staged near Meyers. I’m sure other crews from Minden & Gardnerville are probably there as well. So hopefully with today’s winds embers don’t fly our way. A neighbor just came back from Mt Rose and said the view towards Echo is very scary as it appears the fire is heading more in west shore pattern and the roads in that area a very narrow to say the least
As you state CalFire isn’t running the show. I’m sure there is a strategy but they just don’t have to time to explain it. Sadly Claycord has to many armchair firefighters that don’t know the terrain or how fires like this are fought. Instead these people blaming everything on politics maybe the need to spend their energy sending safe vibes or prayer to the fire fighters and residents of the Tahoe basin.
Do you think he just pulls money, aircraft, firefighters etc. out of a hat? Where do you think these resources come from when several of the largest fires in history are burning simultaneously. Come on people, use your brains and stop trying to politicize this.
California has a $75 billion dollar budget surplus in the latest fiscal year, and in addition is getting $26 billion from Biden’s American Rescue legislation. So, that is where the resources are but Newsom allocates that money elsewhere to programs like buying up hotels for the homeless and health care for illegals.
They have strongly suggested that visitors leave the past few days and most showed the intelligence to do so. From the Y up to Round Hill is a ghost town except for locals. Sadly the Tahoe Airport is to small to stage any air tankers as that would be a great staging point. And the two tankers that fly out of Reno are hitting the Dixie fire. People don’t realize there is a finite amount of tankers. There are no resources left so the crews are doing the best they can in a west that is on fire from Canada to Mexico and from the coast to the Rockies.
You’re absolutely wrong about Tahoe airport: it can handle and handled regular service of Boeing 737-300, 200 and DC-9 for years.
It could handle a DC-10 tanker in an emergency.
Furthermore, South and midwest crews can absolutely assist in mtn firefighting and do ( see Kansas firefighter Peekaboo)
The key to containment is not extinguishing the current fire but forecasted fuel deprivation. And in this case, the Echo Peak Ridge line is so steep that its near impossible to stage a backfire ( thats from my cousin whos there…A Wyoming based smoke jumper FYI)
The tiny City of SLT airport is in the line of the fire. And when was the last time you saw it. I go but it at least 15-18 times a year and the runways have been shorted and there are storage lots at the end of them.
The past few fire seasons they have run tankers out of the Minden “Airport” which consists of a couple of strips and a small building. It was built for military planes but also has quite a bit of small plane traffic. It was used last year for the Topaz Fire and recently the Tamarack Fire. But there has been no activity there for this fire so far. The Carson City Airport would not work as it has short runways as well.
GOES-West satellite shows prevailing wind effect on smoke and effect of increasing winds in late afternoon.
https://tinyurl.com/pm5w6fjw
Good source for news
https://www.mtdemocrat.com/
When air attack is active can watch track of aircraft
https://www.flightradar24.com/38.72,-120.86/10
Sadly the winds are coming from the wrong direction for both the Caldor and Dixie fires. If they were coming from the southeast then the fire would burn back on itself.
Just saw a photo of the fire burning on Echo Ridge just above Meyers….And also heard from a nurse at Barton that the hospital was evacuated at 3am this morning. Most patients were move to Carson Tahoe in Carson City or Carson Valley Med Ctr in Gardnerville. Harrah’s and Harvey’s are set up for Firefighter rest breaks and feedings. Shelters for humans and animals are set up in Carson City and Gardnerville. Neighbor said there is a pretty good stream of CA vehicles with trailers coming down Spooner Pass into the Carson Valley. Us in the valley will do all we can to help these people as they are our neighbors
Awww I remember Camp Concord! I was ten years old when my mom sent me and I hated every minute of it. I truly hope our wildlife will be ok through all the human made craziness.
Thank you, Well Folks, for giving us the solid truth about the appalling situation. Thanks are also due to the many towns which are opening their public buildings and animal shelters to help those fleeing.
Just please get your mountain lion-fighting, tough SELF out of there (BEFORE the smoke is so thick that you cannot follow the curves on those mountain roads) if an evac order comes!
Thanks Antler, but if it makes it this far well…..The path of destruction would be apocalyptic. And if I headed anywhere it would be inland or south on 395.
Our Kiwanis Club just got a request from the Gardnerville Kiwanis to make sandwiches and other things for the evacuation center their. We have a couple of members doing a Costco run for items and the rest of us on the crew will be heading to the community/senior center down there and make sandwiches, a couple of different salads and some cookies for evacuees. Another crew will be joining groups at the Carson City senior center to make things to keep in the fridges there and drive down the next couple of days.
Sometimes the fire wins. There will be some small victories and hopefully nobody is injured or worse but this one and the Dixie fire don’t appear to be running out of steam anytime soon. The weather, fuel and topography are driving these fires and until these factors change, the firefighters and all other personnel assigned to these incidents are going to have their hands full. Tough times ahead. To all those involved, stay safe and thank you!
The winds in the Sierra, Tahoe basin & Carson Valley have been almost no stop the past 2 years. Locals that have lived in the area all their lives said it’s never been like this before
Sadly there is lots of fuel 8n all directions
New evacuation orders are in for all of SLT & the west shore (Richardson Bay, Emerald Bay etc). And the winds are ramping up as well
Evacuation in effect for the City of SLT
Gardnerville community center is at capacity with evacuees so now they are being sent to the Carson City Community center. When that is filled…who knows. Maybe out to Dayton or up to Reno. 22,000+ people is a lot to find shelter for
Sounds like Myers is in serious trouble. And Lake Tahoe is in the path, once again. I wonder about Donner now. Wish I could send you some of our rain. God protect those firefighters.
Chuckie
Donner isn’t even in the picture. As of this morning evacuations are running up the east side and go as far as Round Hill/Elk Point and include all of the Kingsbury area down to the Foothill Rd side which is near Genoa NV. Yesterdays winds were not as bad as they thought they would be but there is another strong wind/red flag warning today until 11pm.