Four-alarm fire scorches Antioch homes

A fire official said a four-alarm fire that started this afternoon in Antioch caused $650,000 of damage to five to six homes.

The fire was first reported at 4:36 p.m. in the 900 block of Burwood Way where it destroyed one home and damaged four to five others. Fire officials initially said the fire damaged four other homes.

The fire started in some brush and when the wind whipped it up it spread quickly to the homes, fences and other vegetation, Operations Chief Lon Goetsch said.

A total of five acres of vegetation burned. Police assisted by evacuating residents from the homes in the area affected by the fire. No one was injured.

The fire was under control at 6:15 p.m., Goetsch said.

Fifty-six fire personnel, including five chiefs, responded to the blaze with 15 engines, two truck companies, a breathing support unit and one water tender.

A strike team from Solano County also responded because two other fires were burning in the county.

Goetsch said:

“We were already resource challenged.”

But by the time the strike team arrived, Contra Costa County firefighters had the upper hand on the fire.

A second blaze this afternoon in Brentwood sent two people to the hospital. That fire was first reported at 3:28 p.m. in the first block of Sycamore Avenue.

A third fire was reported just after 4 p.m. off Evora Road in unincorporated Contra Costa County. The brush fire burned 45 acres and destroyed one shed, Cal Fire Battalion Chief Ryan Michaels said.

The fire’s forward progress was stopped at about 6 p.m. and it was contained by about 8 p.m.

The fire threatened a PG&E substation and a gun range, where people evacuated safely.