 Good evening. This is the 6 p.m. Press Conference for the CZU complex. My name is Jonathan Cox, deputy chief for Cal Fire here in the San Mateo Santa Cruz unit. As always, if you could just mute your telephones, please take any conversations outside the press briefing area and keep your masks on at all times. Just wanted to bring everybody up to speed after the weather came through yesterday and we found ourselves here getting wet last night. Over the course of the evening across California, the Cal Fire confirmed that there were over 300 lightning strikes in the state overall. 10 of those caused new fires or 10 new fires occurred overnight and zero. None of those fires occurred in the San Mateo Santa Cruz unit. So no lightning caused fires over the last 24 hours, which if you remember when we were standing here 24 hours ago, we were all highly concerned about with the red flag conditions. With that on the CZU lightning complex this evening, we're up to 78,684 acres. Obviously, we get more specific on the numbers. The more we're able to ground truth it with people on the ground and we are we are confirming 78,684 acres this evening. We remain at 13% contained and have over 25,000 structures that still remain threatened due to the fire. We also can confirm this evening that 276 structures have been destroyed. That is both in San Mateo and Santa Cruz County. A large majority of those structures are in Santa Cruz County. And obviously that information will get down to the specifics as it gets released to each EOC at the county level. And finally, some even better news. We're up to 1,609 firefighters personnel assigned to this incident. Obviously every number of firefighters that comes on the line has a direct correlation to the percent increase in containment that we can gain. So that's a welcome welcome development for us with that. I'm gonna pass it off for an operational overview from Cal Fire IMT three ops section chief Mark Brunton. Good evening. So today with the weather that we had really led us to get in there and do a lot of good work. We had a lot of progress in the fire today with the clear air. We were able to fly a lot more aircraft. I'll address that here shortly. And on the ground again, as Chief Cox said that we brought in more resources and we were able to get more heavy equipment, the bulldozers and so forth that are going to help us construct those those lines. So a lot of good work going on. I predominantly up in the north zone. We're having good progress of their line construction continuing. The fire still is backing into low Marmar and butano. But again, it's pretty much creeping. We are monitoring that it's not making any sort of threat to those communities, but it is still advancing. I'll be it slowly. There is a a whole road on the division golf and kilo that have been talking about that lines been improved. The fire is creeping down into that it's holding, which is great because that is keeping fire from from making any sort of advancement into potentially Santa Clara County. So that's looking really good. We're very happy with the results there as we're looking at the highway nine corridor continued work along that corridor. Again, as I've said before, difficult terrain to work in very steep terrain, heavy fuels, not the most ideal area to put our control lines like we typically do. But it is we're making do with it. We're making it work and it is holding in most all locations in the state park down below Ben Lohman continued work in there. That's going to be one of our challenge points. One of those areas. It's going to be a lot of work, a lot of planning, but we are making advancements there throughout the south skin looking really good. Our containment line, our primary or secondary line on that south part of the fire is solid. The area that we burned in yesterday. Fantastic. It's holding. It's doing what we want. Any fire that is burned down to that is either self-migrated meaning extinguished or it is holding on that line, which is exactly what we wanted to do. So it really, really minimizes that threat to Santa Cruz and the UC campus. So it's looking really good. Very happy with that. Those results in body dune, continuing work within around those structures. Again, painstaking work, a lot of structures out there, a lot of heavy fuels, still some fire creeping throughout that. But again, that's a lot of work just digging in and getting after it and taking care of business. We did a small burn operation along Empire grade road to Martin road that kind of puts in a nice control line for us. So it keeps spread going to the west and affecting more homes. So that's a good, good control line. We did to button that little bit up. And then as far as our air program didn't fly any of the fixed wing air tankers on it didn't really have a need for that. But what was critical is the flight, the use of our helicopters. We have six water dropping helicopters assigned to this incident. And today was the best day yet. We were able to drop 200,000. That's 200,000 gallons throughout the day in fire suppression activities with our helicopters. So with our ground troops, our aerial Air Force going great day and a lot of good work out there and a lot of advancement work moving forward with the weather we're expecting. I think we're gonna have more days like this and hopefully get us closer to the end of suppressing this fire. Speaking next from the Santa Cruz County Sheriff's Office Chief Deputy Chris Clark. Well, good evening. So I wanted to touch on a few things. A few things tonight one 79 personnel working the valley. If you've been if you've been displaced, I want you to know and kind of get a feeling and understanding of kind of what our police presence looks like near your home. And so today 79 folks worked work the San Lorenzo Valley. That was 33 of our people here at the Sheriff's Office. And we were rated by 46 additional officers through Mutual Aid from agencies over the hill and as well as in within within our county. And I kind of want to give you an idea kind of what typically that situation would look like just to kind of give you some perspective of how much police presence is up here. So the San Lorenzo Valley when it comes to policing you that's broken into three separate beats three separate zones, police by basically at any one given time over a 24 hour period under normal circumstances and be police by three deputies. So today we had 79 and not only that we broke those three zones down into 17 specific zones. So to kind of give you an idea three larger zones broken down into 17 more specific areas manned by 79 officers and deputies in those zones driving around and looking for people that shouldn't be there or responding to people that needed that needed evacuating or had an emergency that that they needed help with. In terms of calls for service. So today, we responded to 17 suspicious people, or persons calls that came in, as well as 11 welfare checks. And, and we did make arrests. And so you know our guys are out there again, I want to assure the folks in San Lorenzo Valley, they were committed to providing this police presence and looking for people that are potentially looking to pray on on you and your neighbors. And so I want to highlight a couple of these arrests today. So today we arrested two folks. One was a was a 51 year old woman who in Felton that that by that was in an evac in the evacuated zone should not have been there. Another one was a 49 year old man from Santa Cruz. We got into a short pursuit with him. When we ended up with that when he ended up stopping, we found $5,000 in cash, a set of binoculars and a video camera. And so that person went to jail for obviously getting into a pursuit with us resisting arrest, and then being in an evacuated zone. And then we cited two other folks. Again, for being in the evacuated zone, they they although they they they resided there, they were in the evacuated zone should not have been there. And again, just touching on that, I mean, we completely empathize with people wanting to come back. And we we get it, you're displaced. I mean, we, and I've said this before that we have our own personnel that have been evacuated during this fire that that really would love to go back and sleep and you know, sleep in their own bed. But it's just make until this fire gets under more it gets under control. It's just imperative that people stay out of the area to allow Cal Fire to do their job and allow us really to focus on the people that shouldn't be there. In terms of and on another note, so with regards to there's been an outpouring of interest in the firefighters, the firefighter who got his truck broken into and his wallet stolen. And so I think everybody agrees that that I mean, that's just that conduct is just it's absolutely outrageous. So especially for people trying to help. And so what I wanted to do is so our detectives, they they through leads and through their investigation, they and I'm going to need your help on this. And so I'm going to show you some pictures. And so for for the media, these photos will be available to you. But the fire the firefighter who lost his wallet, his cards were used the Safeway grocery store on 41st Avenue in Capitola, and the Shell gas station in Santa Cruz. And then his cards were also used to purchase or attempted purchase a Bitcoin. And so it was about a $2,000 loss. Here's a more close up view. So we believe this person is likely a Valley resident, likely a Bonnie Dune resident. And really what we're hoping is that if you've been evacuated from the Bonnie Dune area, you may recognize him. And so again, I'm holding a picture here, this will get posted to social media. And so maybe maybe you recognize him, maybe it's the Giants hat, maybe it's the longer, lighter colored hair. But either way, this picture will be available. Take a look at it. We encourage you to take a look at it and help us in identifying who this person is. The firefighter himself, we've been again outpouring a support, I feel the call literally from Kansas City, Missouri today, from a lady who said we would love to set up a go fund me in Kansas City, because we just we can't believe that somebody would do that to people that are willing to help. Now, the firefighters family has said that as much as they appreciate it, they just at this point, they the insurance has reimbursed them, and they don't need the assistance. But that just shows you the national spread of just this event and kind of I think just overall kind of how we feel about that sort of conduct. It's just it's, it's, it's crazy. A couple other things. So on another note, and really a somber note, I spoke last night about a person who we found deceased at the end of Last Chance Road. Today, we identified that man as 73 year old Tad Jones. And so we've we've spoken to his family as the last chance resident. And so there will be an autopsy pending German that caused a death there, but and more information to come. But but we identified him and spoke to his family. I want to talk about cell service for just a second. So as I mentioned last night, Verizon and AT&T cell service was a little sporadic. Verizon was able to make some improvements today. So Verizon coverage should be better within the valley. AT&T was working today to kind of fix their issue. So hopefully that will get that that will get fixed as well. We also have been fielding a lot of calls. So the city of Santa Cruz issued and I mentioned this this morning, they issued a pre warning for the city of Santa Cruz. And there's a lot of I know we feel a lot of calls from a lot of uneasy residents. And I just want to let you know that based on the information that we have, there's no imminent danger to the city of Santa Cruz at this time. But nonetheless, that pre warning went out, obviously to keep people better prepared. And so that's that's why that happened. And then in terms of in terms of evacuations for another city, there was a rumor going around Facebook and really was his rumor was about it started with basically somebody saying, Hey, the city of Scots Valley, the order has been lifted. You can go back home if you live in the city of Scots Valley. That's false. That's that's not true. And so we put something out on social media city of Scots Valley, put something out on social media. And so really, I just encourage that encourage you that you know, I know people are on social media, we but go to a trusted site, right? Go to Cal Fire. Go to the Santa Cruz Sheriff's office, San Mateo Sheriff's office to get information, make sure that the source is valid. And then lastly, I just want to touch on a couple resources for people. You know, in terms of, you know, you've been displaced, you know, there's maybe costs that aren't covered by your insurance company. And I said this before, I really I feel for people. I mean, with COVID and with, you know, the financial hardship that that brings, especially at a time like this, if insurance doesn't cover your loss, I can't I can't even imagine how you would, how you'd feed a family, how you'd survive. But nonetheless, I found two resources today that I wanted to pass along to be able to help people with with things that that maybe you not covered by their insurance. So one is it's it's a website disaster assistance dot gov disaster assistance dot gov. And then the other is a FEMA app. So if you go on into the app store or whatever, you know, application vendor you have, you know, whether you have an iPhone or or an Android, but you download the FEMA app, and there's resources on there that would be able to help you if you had costs that you couldn't get reimbursed through normal channels. Thank you. Speaking next from the San Mateo County Sheriff's Office is Sergeant Sal, excuse me, Sergeant Sal Zuno. Good evening. As Deputy Chief Clark mentioned, we have safety and security teams that are patrolling the areas that have been affected and evacuated 24 hours a day. We're doing this to protect your property. We're doing this to keep you safe and to also keep suspicious people out. We have we did have an incident where some people snuck in to try to check on their property and ended up getting caught in a hazard. So I just want to remind you, please do not attempt to go back to check on your property. If your property has been affected by fire, there are a lot of unknown hazards that the fire professionals still have to go and inspect and verify. We know that you're very eager to go back home. And once it is safe to do so, we will let you know. As of right now, there's no date to cancel any evacuation order. We have also heard rumors. So that's not true because the fire is still very active. And also in unfortunately, a lot of people are taking advantage of the people's vulnerability and there are a lot of fire related scams going on right now with social media. Just want to remind you guys, fire personnel, law enforcement personnel in uniform will never approach you and ask you for money. They're never going to call your home and ask you for money. So if you receive a phone call something via social media, please vet it before you donate any funds. Thank you. Speaking next, representing all of the unified command agencies in control of this incident is Cal fire incident management team three incident commander Billy C. Good evening. Obviously you're probably hearing some of the helicopters flying around. That's a good day. Obviously we're able to get the rotor wing up today, working on this incident. And I believe we're going to be timing all six helicopters out on this incident today, which is a good firefighting day for folks out on the ground. As we move into the next three or four days, we're looking at also a wind pattern that will increase the humidity, decrease the temperatures a bit still at the higher elevations. We're still looking at very dry conditions at the lower elevations. It's going to temper the fire activity. The fire is challenging some of the lines of some of the places, but it's a backing slope progressing fire. Our firefighters are out on the ground. They're working aggressively to get containment lines put in. Obviously there's some difficulties in some areas. What we normally try to do traditionally is work on high ridge lines. And obviously now we're down in lower drainages, side hills and mid slope behind the homes trying to protect the infrastructure best as possible. So our traditional methods of what we normally do is going to be challenged with this incident just because of the amount of intermix of homes and the train features that are out there. Obviously we increased our personnel numbers today, although small, it is an increase and it's a benefit to this incident. And we'll continue to see a trickle effect of both personnel and resources showing up here over the next few days. Thank you. And our final speaker representing Cal Fire San Mateo Santa Cruz unit Chief, excuse me, unit chief Ian Larkin. As Chief C just stated, we're starting to make progress and with the resources along with the improved weather. Our crews are out there working as hard as they can. The terrain they're working in is very treacherous, very steep. They have steep canyons that are making it difficult for them to get in there and get the direct line that put in. But they're working as hard as they possibly can and as fast as they can in an attempt to get people back into the area. Also, our cooperating agencies such as PG&E and other agencies are out there inspecting their infrastructure in order to get power and everything back into the areas before we can start to let evacuees back in. That's going to take a little bit of time. So we continue to ask for your patience. Let us get the work done that needs to be done to make that environment as safe as possible so that we can get people back into their residence. As you heard today, it's a welcome site to be able to get aircraft up. That's been one of the factors that has helped hamper our efforts is not to be able to fly our aircraft in order to help control the fire. As I keep saying, this is a historic event. And with that comes everything with that. It's going to be a long process. This is a long haul. It's not something that's just going to be going away at the end of September or October. We're going to be here dealing with this thing for more than a year, the aftermath of it. So please be diligent with us and have some patience and we'll get you try to get you back into your homes and get this in control as soon as we can. Thank you. Alright, happy to answer any questions. Yep. So the question is related to our is the Sheriff's Department citing people in the evacuation zone uniformly or on case by case basis. Yeah, so my instruction to our patrol staff is exactly what I'd mentioned in this press conference, which is just that that if you're that I've said this before and their instruction is if you're in the evacuated area, you shouldn't be there. It's against the law. We understand. And again, we empathize with with somebody's desire to go there. But no, if you're in the evacuated area, you're going to get a citation. And then if you're in the evacuated area and you're there doing something else you shouldn't be or you absolutely have no business being there at all because you're not even a resident of the area, you're likely going to jail. Yes, the question was related to people in Bonnie Dune who haven't haven't left and feel as though they're there to protect. And this issue has come up a couple of times. There's there's two things that I think we can say pretty firmly. One is that we do not want anybody to get hurt or or or or or become trapped. And by that, I mean, we use air tankers with 20,000 gallons of retardant in that we use fire as a tool to actually stop an oncoming fire. And if those types of operations are not coordinated or communicated to other people that might be out there, the last thing we want to happen is an injure a preventable injury to happen on the line on the fire line. So our perspective is obviously very concerned with safety and people's health and well being. Having said that, as a human, I can sympathize with them for wanting to save their property and their community that they love. Our message is, you know, we need space to operate. We need to be in the evacuated zone to be able to get our crews in to be able to work safely. And nothing is more important than having the space and the ability to do that. People who decide to stay on their property and defend their own property is obviously their choice. But any sort of organization that made impede with firefighting operation is not only potentially harmful for them, but it's potentially harmful for our firefighters as well. The governor made a point that mutual aid in California is something to take pride in. Can you talk about how mutual aid has been activated in this incident? Yeah, I mean, so this comes up kind of year over year, our mutual aid system in California. You know, the unfortunate reality of living in California is that the system that deploys resources to any type of disaster is well versed and well oiled machine. It happens daily on small incidents locally, all the way up to incidents like we're seeing right now. And because it's utilized so often, the implementation of it is faster than anywhere else that in the nation. And what that really means is you can get a resource from LA County on the road within hours to head up to Santa Cruz County. And the coordination that goes into that the kind of the backside of communications, the financial payment side of things, identification, all of those things are already pre-established. With that being said, when you have over two dozen large incidents break out literally on the same night, it is going to test the mutual aid system. Because there's a finite number of resources, obviously. And to get everybody on the road at the same time, you know, it's literally a capacity issue. How big is the bandwidth of the pipe to get all that information flowed to the right agency? So I think we all take pride in the system we work with here in California as far as mutual aids concerned. I tell you what, there is no way in California that you can deal with an emergency of this size without that full force kind of all hands on deck that is mutual aid here. There's a lot of talk about progress today, which is great. Are there other parts of the fire? What is the most dangerous part of this fire that could, you know, break out or get worse? Is there like a specific part? Yes. Yes. And if I'm hearing your cry, the question is what's the most dangerous spot on the fire right now? I think Mark would be the best to answer that. Yeah, certainly, probably the most challenging and the one that we're most concerned with is on the highway nine corridor. Basically, from what you see Division K all the way down to about Division W. W. Whiskey Whiskey. That's that whole stretch is the most active. That's the area that as Chief C mentioned earlier, and I mentioned earlier is very problematic in the fact that we can't employ our traditional strategy and tactics there due to the topography due to the fuel loading and so forth. Because of that and because that has more of the open flank of the fire. And that that's our that's our challenge. That's the one that that we're really having to put our plans to be very careful with our plans or to and make sure that we really look at that closely. We have to do a lot reconnaissance in that area. It's just not our typical go to bread and butter type operation that we have to do there. So because of that and because it is painstakingly slow because you have to go through around a bunch of homes and so forth. That that that one is the concerning to us and and and to myself and my staff. The area in Bunny Dune that's just going to take time. Lot of it is as complicated per se and technical but it's because of the amount of the resource the structures and the limited resource we have to go and get every hot spot and get around every home. That's just going to be time take time. The other parts of the fire a little bit more straightforward and once we have some specialized resources we'll be able to get a lot of production around that that western part of the fire and into the north part of the fire. It's just once we get those resources. But yes to answer your question that eastern part of the fire is my concern right now. Sure. The questions related to the progress and actions that were taken out on the areas behind Ben Lohman especially in relation to the air attack. Chief Brunton. Certainly. So what you were witnessing there was a lot of the work that we're doing as I was mentioned earlier around the backside of the structures in particular just below Ben Lohman in the state park and then moving from that north. So what we're doing we've put in some line both handline and endoser line early in the incident to to check the fire up if you will to slow its progress and move forward not the kind of finished completed line that we really like to use where where it has a full control factor and we can use the advantage to extinguish and put out the fire. So now we're going back we're improving that hasty line. We you saw the the helicopters dropping there to support the crews down below because of the active fire. We you know they're they're on their own. We don't always have maybe a hose that we can put in there with them. So they're out there with their hand tools or with the dozers and the helicopters are supporting that effort. So they're extinguishing cooling things down so our ground troops can get in there and put in that good control line. So that's that's what you saw. That's what you're going to continue to see for the coming days. That same operation and that's what's going on there. And as you'll see that progressing up the valley and that's that's good progress. You can almost monitor the proud progress by just following that activity up the valley. All right. Everybody who's up here will be available for questions after this press conference. Just a reminder we'll be back here tomorrow morning at six a.m. I want to conclude the press conference and say thank you for joining us.