A frame from a video of the fire burning along the 91 Freeway. Courtesy @lordevictorII on Twitter.
A frame from a video of the fire burning along the 91 Freeway. Courtesy @lordevictorII on Twitter.

Firefighters doused a small brush fire that seriously damaged a home along the 91 Freeway Wednesday afternoon.

It appears a downed power line sparked the blaze around 3:45 p.m. just below the 91 west of the 710 Freeway, a fire official said.

The flames ran along the shoulder of the 91 Freeway, eating up brush and extending into a home, damaging it enough that it was uninhabitable, LBFD spokesman Jake Heflin said. Two other homes also had minor damage, he said.

Video on social media showed flames burning directly behind houses in the neighborhood. The blaze sent smoke wafting onto the freeway.

Traffic in the area was snarled. More than 50 firefighters rushed to the scene to douse the blaze, which they had out shortly after 5 p.m., Heflin said.

Nobody was hurt, but rescuers found a cat who was having trouble breathing, Heflin said.

The fire broke out as weather conditions were extremely dangerous, with red flag warnings in effect throughout much of Los Angeles County. Santa Ana winds were gusting between 40 and 60 mph in parts of the Southland and were expected to continue through Thursday morning. The air is also extremely dry, with humidity in the single digits, putting firefighters throughout the region on high alert.

 

Jeremiah Dobruck is executive editor of the Long Beach Post where he oversees all day-to-day newsroom operations. In his time working as a journalist in Long Beach, he’s won numerous awards for his investigative reporting and editing. Before coming to the Post in 2018, he wrote for publications including the Press-Telegram, Orange County Register and Los Angeles Times. Reach him at [email protected] or @jeremiahdobruck on Twitter.