By LEE FERRAN Aug. 31, 2009
Thousands of homes are threatened by spreading California wildfire.The firefighters, whose names have not been released, were killed when their vehicle tumbled down the side of a mountain on the northwestern front of the fires where one fire, known as the Station Fire, has already burned more than 20,000 acres, according to the governor's office.
"We ask for your understanding, for your patience as we move through this difficult time, and please, prayers for the families of our two brothers that we lost," Los Angeles County Deputy Fire Chief Mike Bryant said tearfully at a news conference Sunday night. Thirteen other firefighters have been injured, the governor's office reported Sunday.
At least 18 homes were completely destroyed by the Station Fire. Another fire in Auburn, Calif., claimed an entire block where resident Kenny James lived.
"Our house is, our house is gone," James told an unidentified woman on his cell phone as he stood amid the scorched rubble of several homes Sunday. "The whole block has been leveled -- our block."
Beyond the thousands of residential homes threatened, the fires could damage a vital television, radio and communications center and observatory on Mount Wilson. Twenty-two television stations and numerous cell phone providers have transmitters at the center, U.S. Forest Service Capt. Mike Dietrich told the AP.
ABC News' local affiliate KABC is among those whose antennas are threatened.
"If you receive ABC7 by off-air antenna, you could lose our ABC7 signal," the station said in an e-mail bulletin, the Los Angeles Times reported.
"It's not a matter of if it impacts Mount Wilson, it's a matter of when," L.A. County Fire Capt. Mike Savage told KABC Sunday.
The Mount Wilson Observatory, a fixture in Southern California since its founding in 1904, is responsible for discovering the existence of "countless galaxies," and is home to the world's largest publicly-accessible telescope, the observatory's Web site said.
