Southern California wildfire nearly 60-percent contained

Reuters: A fierce wildfire that had threatened 4,000 homes northwest of Los Angeles was nearly 60-percent contained on Saturday as favorable weather conditions helped beat it back, officials said.

"We actually have a pretty good marine layer, which is like thick fog on the coast moving inland, cooler temperatures and higher humidity," Captain Dan Horgon of the Ventura County Fire Department told Reuters. "That coupled with our efforts out there with our firefighters have made the situation quite a bit better," he said.

The Springs Fire in coastal Ventura County has blackened about 28,000 acres of rugged brushland since it started on Thursday. Officials said the blaze was now expected to be fully under control by sometime on Monday. All fire-related evacuation orders had been lifted by Saturday evening.

About 4,000 homes had been threatened by the fire, but only 15 have been damaged, Horgon said. There are no reports of deaths or injuries, although one firefighter and a civilian were hurt in a vehicle collision, the department said on its website.

Until this week, fewer than 12,000 acres had burned since the mid-April start of the Southern California fire season, said Daniel Berlant, a spokesman for the state's Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. That figure has jumped with the Springs Fire and five smaller blazes around the state...

An aerial view of the 2009 Station Fire in Los Angeles,shot by Ron Reiring, Wikimedia Commons via Flickr, under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license