Rain Prompts Official End to Fire Season

Recent rains have prompted Ventura County Fire Department officials to call an end to the 1998 fire season.

About a quarter of an inch of rain was forecast to fall overnight, although the disorganized weather system couldn’t really be called a storm, said Jeff House, a meteorologist with WeatherData Inc., a private firm that provides forecasts for The Times.

The system arrived weaker and slower than originally predicted, saving the county from the high winds and more than half an inch of rain Monday that battered the San Francisco Bay Area.

County residents should see mostly cloudy skies brighten by this afternoon, with the sun breaking through. Temperatures will reach the upper 50s to low 60s.

The next storm system is scheduled to hit the state Friday, although whether rain will reach this far south is uncertain, House said.

Still, enough precipitation has fallen to diminish the danger of more brush fires, said Joe Luna, a Fire Department spokesman.

“There’s moisture in the ground; there’s moisture in the brush,” he said. “Any time we see the fire danger levels start to drop, we officially close fire season.”

The fire season usually runs May 15 through Nov. 15. This year’s first brush fire was June 17 and the season ended Nov. 29.

This year, firefighters fought 40 brush fires that were a quarter of an acre or larger; they consumed a total of 13,673 acres during the season. That figure compares with 26,400 scorched acres in 1997, although all but 400 acres of that total was attributed to a single blaze--the Hopper Canyon fire near Piru.

Similarly, the bulk of 1998’s charred acreage was caused by the 12,613-acre Piru Canyon fire that began Oct. 18, Luna noted.

That blaze cost about $5 million to extinguish, but officials estimate that firefighters’ efforts saved about $17 million in damage to citrus orchards and other property.

No homes were lost to brush fires this year, authorities said.