Firefighters edged closer Tuesday to containing a fire burning near the gateway to Yosemite National Park, with some crews being demobilized and sent back to their home bases.
The fire was more than 60 percent contained as helicopters attacked flames on the eastern perimeter, officials said.
Meanwhile, teams attempting to hand-cut fire breaks on the ground were struggling in steep, rocky canyon terrain, where some areas weren't accessible on foot.
"This isn't the biggest fire in the world, but it's some of the most difficult terrain you can get yourself into," said Gary Wuchner, fire information officer for Yosemite. "These canyons, the walls on them are 1,500 feet straight up."
The blaze started last week when a motor home caught fire. Since then, it has blackened more than 5,200 acres — or 8.1 square miles — on both sides of Highway 140 in the scenic Merced River Canyon.
The recent progress allowed authorities to reopen a stretch of the highway — the western gateway to Yosemite. They lifted all evacuation orders, including one covering Rancheria, a community of 70 homes for Yosemite employees. No structures were lost.
On Sunday, the South Central Sierra Interagency incident team called for a DC-10 to provide aerial support to numerous 21-person hotshot crews clearing firebreaks in remote areas. The crews and equipment were available because the fire was one of the few burning in the West.
"The DC-10 took a lot of heat out of the head of the fire," said Raj Singh, spokesman for the incident team. "We were able to get a pretty good containment line around the fire."
Nearly 1,200 ground firefighters faced rattlesnakes, poison oak and dehydration. At least one firefighter was hurt and three slightly injured when a burning tree tumbled down a canyon and hit them.
"It would be a far different fire today had they not done some things a couple of days ago," Wuchner said.
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