Tuesday night report on Big Sur fire from Pfeiffer Ridge: eery quiet, muskrats and what's next.

The terrain at the top of Pfeiffer Ridge on Tuesday night was eerily quiet.

At 7pm there were no fire trucks and no firemen to be seen on Pfeiffer Ridge Road, almost 48 hours into this wildfire amongst the steep canyons of Big Sur.

That seemed odd, but the Pfeiffer Fire catapulted to the ridge so quickly that much of what could be burned had already done so.

What remained were the stragglers: Downed power lines. Power poles standing half their size and on fire, smoking. Embers glowing in all directions. Rocks and small boulders nestled on the roadway. Round chunks of charcoal the size and shape of sourdough bread loaves glowing, crackling. Retaining walls made of railroad ties on fire, stinking the smoky place up.

The only wildlife was the occasional (and seemingly) disoriented wood rat, scurrying about. Survivors.

All else was silent. Crews had moved onto fresh-burning vegetation, and were cutting lines in the path of the blaze.

What remained was a steep hillside of gray ash below the ridge towards Sycamore Canyon. There were plenty of red hot spots, small trees on fire, sometimes flaring up several hundred yards away. There was fire moving up the eastern slope from Highway 1, approaching the ridge.

It was calmer in this moment, but the fire is by no means done playing out its hand.

Twenty-two structures were gone as of Tuesday night, 14 of them homes. Hundreds of people have been displaced, lives interrupted. Wildlife and domestic animals are clearly in stress.

As for the fire-fighting machinery, there’s a squadron of 500-plus firefighters who have reported for duty, plus nine helicopters, including two of the heavy duty Chinooks, sucking ocean water and attacking the fire parcel by parcel. They helped save several structures on the ridge this day.

The four air tankers and two spotter aircraft have also been ready to work, but they have not been in the action yet—visibility is too low. As was the case Sunday and Monday night, there is no air attack during the night.

And while the fire trucks and crews were gathering themselves for a nighttime mission down Sycamore Canyon Road toward Pfeiffer Beach to secure and prepare the southern fire line, some of the real heroes of this fire fight so far have been the local outliers who awakened on their lovely ridge Sunday night and leapt into action. A dozen or more remained on Pfeiffer Ridge supporting each other to carve fire lines, pull hose and save houses themselves.

Their work clearly saved structures and lives early on, a fact that impressed many of the professionals down below.

No surprise that several of these locals have been teammates on the Big Sur Outlaws softball team.

The next few days are critical. An expected frontal system will shift the wind from the southeast to the southwest, and increase its velocity simultaneously. Humidity levels will rise, and then the winds will shift to the prevailing northwest. If all goes well, the south slope below Sycamore Canyon will have burned to the road, taking its low-lying fuel with it, giving firefighters the edge once the winds head from the north.

If they can hold the fire from jumping the road and heading south up the hill towards the Chappelet property, then the Pfeiffer Fire’s days will be numbered, particularly if rains happen to arrive in the coming days. Highway 1 is the eastern border of the fire; Andrew Molera State Park is the border to the north.

As tragic as this fire has been, and emotionally draining to these oft-tested Big Sur natives, the community outreach and interconnectivity is tightly organized. Practice does make perfect. While most on Pfeiffer Ridge were indiscreetly awakened around midnight Sunday by the smell of smoke, the escape route worked as agreed for all.

Underneath the stress and despair is a hope that the Pfeiffer fire is nothing like the Big Sur Basin fire. Ironically, much of the energy and cost fighting that fire was to prevent that beast from jumping to the west side of Highway 1, destroying the homes and businesses that are central to Big Sur’s health. That fire raged for months during the summer and fall of 2008. And five years later one errant fire—the cause of which is still unknown—charged up the hill and did more damage in a couple of days as it lit up the Big Sur trees in December. It will be a Christmas to remember.

NOTES:

• When Captain Cooper School put out the word that it was too smoky, River School in Carmel invited the kids in, and made room for their Christmas program, too.

• Businesses are all open, “doing what it does best: providing service,” according to Nepenthe (and the Chamber of Commerce’s) Kirk Gafill.

• The Red Cross has a 24-hour number 320-9989, county mental health services available.

• It’s expected Highway 1 will remain open throughout, unless the fire moves too close.