Montebello brush fire spreads to oil field

SuperScoopers and bulldozers were called Sunday to battle a brush fire that erupted in a riverbed in the Montebello Hills.

Update: According to further reports from KTLA, the blaze spread into Montebello Hills and onto a nearby oilfield, as per Montebello Fire Department Deputy Chief Dan Amador.

Montebello police identified the man as 45-year-old Arturo Miallan Aguilar and said he was arrested on suspicion of arson and negligent fire.

“It does seem like the Montebello Hills are underneath management”, he added. He was booked into the Montebello jail Sunday night in lieu of $35,000 bail, according to Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department records.

High temperatures and strong winds have fueled a wildfire that has burned at least 10 acres in the San Gabriel Valley.

Firefighters battle a blaze in Montebello on August 16, 2015. A heat warning is set to expire at 8 p.m. Voluntary evacuations were ordered for 33 homes on Muscatel and Hazel avenues and Darlington Street, all south of San Gabriel.

Some structures were threatened, but crews managed to protect them, Amador said.

The fire was reported just after 1 p.m. and the smoke can be seen as far away as central Los Angeles.

One firefighter suffered heat exhaustion and was taken to a hospital for treatment, Amador said.

Two Super Scooper CL-145 airplanes on lease from Canada joined two water-dropping helicopters and more than 120 firefighters from throughout the area on the ground to control the fire. The fixed-wing planes were skimming water from the lake at the Santa Fe Dam Recreation Area, according to Irwindale police. Steve Ruiz said. Some residents left voluntarily, however no mandatory evacuation orders were issued.

The blaze, dubbed the Lincoln Fire, prompted the closure of Lincoln Boulevard between Read Drive and San Gabriel Boulevard, the Montebello Police Department said in a statement.

Officials shut down all eastbound lanes of the 60 Freeway at San Gabriel Boulevard about 4:30 p.m.as the fire drew dangerously close to the freeway, according to CHP logs.