Brush Fire Skirts Affluent Sand Canyon Area

Standing atop a hill in the calm of dusk, surveying the blackened hills around Mountain Park Road, Dave and Macel Barron reflected on their good fortunes.

Their prized rose bushes were burned, the chicken coop consumed, and their steel tool shed melted. But their home in an affluent Sand Canyon neighborhood escaped unscathed from a fast-moving brush fire that consumed more than 1,100 acres in the Santa Clarita Valley and was still burning out of control late Sunday night.

From their vantage point the Barrons, both 46, could see helicopters dropping water onto hot spots glowing in the distance, but Los Angeles County fire officials said all homes were out of danger and that they expected the blaze to be contained by 6 a.m. today.

‘Lost Shed’

“We lost a tool shed, the fence and the chicken coop, but the house could have been like that,” Dave Barron said.

“It was the closest that any fire has ever gotten to our house,” Macel Barron said, as she snapped photos of the damage.

Although flames came perilously close to at least six homes on Mountain Park Road, the Barrons’ tool shed and chicken coop were the only structures lost in the blaze.

The calm of dusk was a stark contrast to the commotion of midday, when Sand Canyon residents and firefighters rallied to save the expensive homes. As a dozen firefighters stood in the Barrons’ back yard battling the blaze, Dave Barron ran through the house, gathering photo albums and other possessions.

Cooperation Noted

Throughout the Sand Canyon area, horse owners worked to evacuate the many horses that live on the canyon’s ranches. As flames raced within 200 yards of the Arabian Pleasure Horse Ranch, six horse owners led the 22 animals stabled there to safety.

“They got kind of nervous but they were pretty eager to jump in the trailers and get out of here,” said Don DeGroote, of Valencia.

Residents of several homes on Warmuth Road took their animals to neighboring homes and ranches. Members of the Arabian Horse Society sent trailers to help transport horses out of the area.

More than 100 people were urged to leave homes that were threatened by flames. But most chose to stay and protect their luxury Tudor- and ranch-style homes.

Doug Van Horn, of Newhall, whose in-laws live on Red Clay Street, said that “everyone chipped in to take care of each other. . . . That’s the way the canyon is, everybody knows everybody.”

Standing in the driveway of his home off Pacy Street, Floyd Irvin, 49, said he would not move from the area.

“They have fires every year out here. You go through this two or three times every summer for nine years, you don’t get too excited,” said Irvin as his front-lawn sprinklers ran full blast.

“They haven’t lost a house here in 15 years,” he said.

Santa Clarita City Councilman Howard P. (Buck) McKeon, who lives in a two-story, Spanish-style home on Raven Hill Road, said he has lived in the area for 20 years and this is the closest that a brush fire has come from his home.

“The thing that impressed me is what a great job the Fire Department did and how the neighbors worked to help each other,” he said. “When you go through something like this, it’s just great to see how people rally around to help each other.”

McKeon was backing out of his driveway when he noticed the fire in the hills near his home. He said he went back inside, changed clothes and then went out to help his neighbors.

Pam Gunnison, 33, a four-year resident of the Ravenhill Street area, said that although she and her husband did not want to leave their home, they took their 12 Arabian horses, several goats and dogs to nearby stables.

However, deputies attempted to arrest her husband, Gunnison said, as he returned to their house with the empty horse trailer.

The more than 1,100 acres of brush consumed by late Sunday had not burned in more than 40 years, fire officials said.

The fire burned all the way to the pavement of the Antelope Valley Freeway north of the Via Princessa exit.

Freeway traffic was slowed in both directions for more than two hours, and the freeway was closed briefly about 7 p.m. Thick, white smoke billowed across all the traffic lanes, reducing visibility to about 200 feet. Some motorists stopped on the shoulder to watch the flames. A few produced video cameras.

Backfires Set

Firefighters set backfires to contain the blaze and helicopters and air tankers conducted water drops at the freeway’s edge. More than 350 firefighters battled the blaze.

At about 11 p.m., county Fire Department Spokesman Corey Lovers said that the fire was about 60% contained and that all homes were out of danger.

The only injury reported by Sunday evening was a sprained ankle suffered by a prison inmate working on a fire crew.

Times Staff Writer Carlos V. Lozano contributed to this story.