Cris Alarcon, News@InEDC.com

(PLACERVILLE, CALIFORNIA) Sept 14, 2022 — Latest FIRIS mapping has the fire at 63,427 acres, growth was mostly to the south between French Meadows Road and Blacksmith Flat and the eastern portion of the fire.

The Super Scoopers are back, dipping out of Union Valley Reservoir and dropping above Stumpy Meadows. The southeast corner of the fire is one of today’s priorities.

Air operations continue to work on the east side of Stumpy Meadows Reservoir and in the Foresthill/Todd Valley areas at 6:00pm on 9/14/22

Situation Summary

Firefighters continue to hold the Mosquito Fire inside established control lines with the help of cooler temperatures and higher humidity. Throughout the day, crews continued to patrol, mop up and secure control lines along the Foresthill Road corridor, with a heavy focus on the area where yesterday’s spot fire made an aggressive run towards the community. Aerial reconnaissance shows very little smoke production in the areas below the communities of Foresthill and Michigan Bluff. Successful firing operations continue to take place along Deadwood Road to cut off the fire’s growth to the north.

The Mosquito Fire’s eastern front continues to steadily grow with active fire behavior into dense forested areas with critically dry fuels and little fire history. A majority of the fire’s smoke column today was produced by the fire activity in the Middle Fork of the American River on the east side. Dozers and heavy equipment worked throughout the day to continue expanding control lines to stop the fire’s eastwardly growth. On the southeast corner of the fire near Stumpy Meadows, crews constructed control lines in an effort to cut off the fire in the Rubicon River drainage. The southern portion of the fire continues to hold with firefighters constantly patrolling all portions of these control lines and mopping up hot spots well into the interior of the fire perimeter to ensure there is no threat of escape.

Today’s southwesterly winds were lighter than Tuesday, but still provided the needed air mixing to push the smoke inversion out of the fire area. With this clearer air, aircraft assigned to the incident were able to be used heavily for various operations around the fire. Helicopters have been busy throughout the day conducting water and retardant dropping missions in order to assist ground crews in extinguishing hot spots and preventing fire growth. Multiple mobile retardant bases are located around the fire to assist helicopters with quick refilling of fire retardant. Multiple Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) are being used to assist with reconnaissance, mapping, and infrared capabilities to assist firefighters in locating hot spots near the fire’s edge.

Here’s your look at yesterday’s heroic effort to defend Foresthill. A shift in the winds caused a spot fire that directly threatened the town. But thanks to previous placement of dozer and hand lines and an extraordinary and lightning-fast attack using dozers, hand crews, defensive firing operations, helicopters and numerous air tankers – including every very large tanker in the state – disaster in Foresthill was avoided. The main fire front was held and structure protection efforts prevented the loss of many imperiled properties.