Wildfire a frequent and familiar foe in Lake County

Fire is a familiar foe in Lake County.

No other county in California has experienced wildfires more frequently in the past seven years, on such a stunning scale of both size and destruction, said state Sen. Mike McGuire, who represents the rural county with 68,000 residents.

“There is no other county in the Golden State that has received such a devastating blow when it comes to wildland disaster,” McGuire said Tuesday as he surveyed yet another disaster unfolding in his district. “The people of Lake County have suffered significantly.”

The 13,000-acre Pawnee fire east of Clear Lake is the first major wildland blaze this year. But it’s just the latest to explode in Lake County, where fires break out year after year, leaving scars on the landscape that grow back, only to burn again.

Many wildland fires, a few hundred acres or smaller, have burned in Lake County since 2012. But they are mostly forgotten, overshadowed by the big ones: The Valley, Rocky, Jerusalem, Clayton, Sulphur, Wye-Walker, Scotts and now the Pawnee.

Eight fires in seven years have devoured more than 200,000 acres of terrain and destroyed nearly 2,600 structures, mostly homes. The worst of the bunch, the 2015 Valley fire, killed five people.

“The concentration in one county is unheard of in modern California history. The epicenter of California’s new normal has been in Lake County,” McGuire said.

Most of those fires erupted later in summer or fall, traditionally the most dangerous part of fire season. This is June.

“The fire is burning like a September fire. That’s scary. How will (fires) burn in September?” said Northshore Fire Chief Jay Beristianos, whose fire department serves Spring Valley, where the Pawnee fire broke out Saturday evening.

There are many reasons why Lake County seems to burn so easily and often, mainly in the east and southeast, where fires tend to burn hotter and faster.

“We’ve had more wind events recently combined with an abundance of fuel,” said Greg Bertelli, Cal Fire division chief for Lake County. “Lake County has always been kind of known to have a lot of fires. Nature, fuel, location, longer summers, drier winters.”

Another reason comes from the region’s wind patterns. They line up at times with the hilly terrain and drainages, and in extreme heat and low humidity, create a bad combination for fire that pushes flames along, often deeper into remote areas that are hard to reach, Bertelli said.

But summers have been hotter and drier and fires are burning differently, firefighters said.

Lake County Fire Chief Willie Sapeta is chief of greater Lower Lake and Clearlake, where about one-third of the county’s residents live. Fires have burned 500 homes there in three years. He’s heard more people talking about leaving Lake County, unable to stay with what’s become an annual concern.

“We’ve seen a little bit of people decide not to remain in the district just because of that threat,” said Sapeta, who’s been with the department 30 years. He cited a few people who were burned out during the Valley fire, then moved to Lower Lake and lost their homes again in the Clayton fire.

But many choose to stay, just as people in earthquake, hurricane and tornado country remain.

“We have a beautiful place to live,” said Bertelli, a longtime resident in the hills between Kelseyville and Cobb. “It’s our home. That’s why people still live here. Family. Friends.”

“With that beauty comes the danger of living in a wildland area,” said Beristianos, another longtime Lake County resident. “People who come from out of here don’t realize what they’re walking into. There is no big municipal fire department. There is an inherent risk when you drive into the woods.”

Virgil Balsley, 94, sat on the back deck of his Spring Valley home Tuesday afternoon, calmly looking at the fire-scarred Walker Ridge starkly rising behind his porch. He bought the Cedar Way property in 1977 and spent seven years building the two-story home where he lived for more than three decades with his late wife, Evelyn.

He also built the neighborhood community center, laid concrete for many homes, and has spent decades fostering ties with his community. Though he’s lived through more fires than he can count, he refused to leave in the Pawnee fire, just as he won’t move from his beloved home to flee from potential future blazes.

He worked hard to build his life in Lake County, and he made a vow to his wife, who died a year and a half ago.

“This is the house my wife and I built,” he said as he sat near an ashtray holding partially smoked Pall Malls as the thermometer reached 90 degrees Tuesday. “We both made a promise we’d die here. I’m waiting. … There are a lot of things I want to do.”

Like many Lake County residents, he’s fiercely loyal to a community that’s been ravaged with unrelenting fires in recent years. Some, like Michael Anderson, say they can’t imagine life away from the rural area.

He’s spent 23 years in Spring Valley and has survived six fires, though the Pawnee fire is the worst he’s seen. It feels like a “roller coaster,” Anderson, 60, said as he sat with several other men outside Spring Valley’s Pantry, which serves as holdout for people who chose not to evacuate the fire zone.

“It’s nerve-wracking, but you can see the morale,” he said. “People are kicked back. It’s not our first rodeo.”

Madeline Lewek-Franco has lived through the Rocky fire and now the Pawnee fire, both of which sent her fleeing to safety at the Moose Lodge in Clearlake Oaks. A few of her neighbors near the intersection of Shasta and Indian Hill roads have talked about moving to places like Oregon, and she’s seen a nearby home go on the market in recent days. But balancing the fear of fire with the daily benefits of rural life is worth it, said the 74-year-old, who was priced out of the Mountain View apartment she rented for decades.

“Every morning, I wake up thankful,” she said. “It’s another beautiful day in the county with beautiful neighbors. It’s beautiful and it’s affordable.”

The county is home to Clear Lake, the largest natural freshwater lake entirely in California (although Lake Tahoe is larger, its shores are split with Nevada). The lake sits roughly in the middle of the county, with a large portion of the Mendocino National Forest to the north. Several small towns dot the lake’s edges, while open space stretches to the east, down the hills to Highway 5.

The Pawnee fire is a re-run of sorts for many firefighters and bulldozer operators who now are cutting fire breaks carved out for the earlier blazes, said Bertelli, who learned to fight fires in west Sonoma County and has been with Cal Fire in Lake County for 15 years. “We are opening up old historic lines,” he said.

Many residents and firefighters have now seen fires burning on the same piece of ground three to five times, Bertelli said.

It’s also a repeat for Spring Valley residents who’ve evacuated repeatedly in recent years.

“I’ve lost track of the amount of times those poor people have been evacuated or noticed they should evacuate in the last five years,” Beristianos said.

While some talk of leaving, or have left, many county residents remain resolute in staying.

“Despite significant challenges with these massive wildland fire disasters, the people of Lake County pick themselves up and help their neighbors time after time,” McGuire said.

Staff Writers Randi Rossmann can be reached at 707-521-5412 or randi.rossmann@pressdemocrat.com, and Hannah Beausang can be reached at 707-521-5214 or hannah.beausang@pressdemocrat.com.