Arnold Schwarzenegger Orders California National Guard to Deploy Ground Forces to Fight Wildfires

GOVERNOR SCHWARZENEGGER:

Well, good morning, everybody. I want to say thank you very much to Chief Kerschen and Chief Walters for their briefing and also to Unit Chief Chuchel. I want to also thank General Kight from the National Guard for being here today with us and also some of the local officials, elected officials. And also law enforcement, I want to thank them all for being here.

First, right off the top, I want to just say thank you very much to the brave, courageous and extraordinary firefighters that we have in our state. And I am so proud of them, of the extraordinary work that they have been doing. And I know I've said this many times, that we have, without any doubt, the best trained and the most courageous and the most experienced firefighters in the world. And so we want to thank them and let's give them a big hand for their great work that they have been doing. (Applause) I also want to thank the National Guard for their great effort in working.

As you know, that we have this last week experienced over 1,400 fires all over the state of California. I don't know if we've ever had, in the history, that many fires. And last year I remember we had 18 major fires all over the state. Now we have 1,400 and out of that at least 35 that are really major fires.

But I think that everyone is doing a great job and I just wanted to give you some of the numbers here. The Shasta Complex Fire, we have so far 57,400 acres that are burned, 20 percent is contained. And that's why I'm back here again, even though I was inspecting this fire last Friday. But you know, we want to make sure that we stay on top of the situation and provide everything, all the resources that are necessary. There are two residences that have been destroyed and 267 structures are threatened at this point. We have so far 2,100 personnel that are working out there and fighting the fires and 267 engines. Seven firefighters have been injured and we hope that they recover as quickly as possible.

Now, statewide the figures change, of course, dramatically. We have 423,000 acres that have burned. And just to show you, last year there were approximately 500,000 acres that burned, so we are coming very close to the situation that we were in last year. Fifty structures have been destroyed so far, 18,900 personnel to 19,000 personnel are working on fighting those fires statewide. We have approximately 1,461 engines and 103 helicopters that are working.

I think that they all are doing a great job, but the danger is that our firefighters get stretched thin. A lot of them are working overtime and they are staying up there for more than 12 hours, sometimes 24 hours, 36 hours. So we have to be very careful that they get enough sleep and they get enough rest and this is why we have also asked the National Guard to provide us with 200 extra personnel. There will be 10 groups of 20 each that will be trained by CAL FIRE this weekend and the beginning of next week. So they will be assisting also with the fires and we are very happy that the National Guard has agreed to that and is jumping into action very quickly.

So everyone is really working together on this, the federal government, the locals, the state, everyone is coordinating. I think the fire officials, law enforcement, everyone is working together. We are very happy with the great progress that is being made. But like I said, this one, the Shasta Complex Fire, is a very stubborn one. They have been working very hard at it and it's only been 20 percent contained. So we hope by the end of this week we see some great progress there.

So, again, I want to thank everyone. And I would like to have maybe Chief Walters come out and say a few words about the fires and bring you up to date with some of the details. Thank you very much.

CHIEF WALTERS:

Thank you, Governor. I would say about Sunday we started feeling like we were turning the corner on the situation overall in the state. Certainly we have a long ways to go, in some of the areas in particular -- this is one of them. Butte comes to mind, that county and the surrounding forest as well and also over on the coast in Mendocino and certainly down south Monterey Bay in the Los Padres National Forest. But we are starting to catch some of them. I believe we've gotten in the neighborhood of 80 percent of the fires that occurred contained now. And that doesn't necessarily mean controlled, that's the other issue. Control means you can walk away. But we've got lines around them, we've stopped the forward progress of, we're figuring, about 80 percent of the fires. It's hard to tell when you have almost 1,500 fires.

So anyhow, we're feeling pretty good about our progress. As the Governor mentioned, we're very concerned about the health of our firefighters and we're doing everything we can to get them a little rest here and there and get them out of the smoke when possible. Governor?

GOVERNOR SCHWARZENEGGER:

Chief Chuchel, you may want to say a few words about the fire? Thank you.

CHIEF CHUCHEL:

Well, I think this has been a difficult time for all of here, especially the citizens of Shasta County, incorporating with 158 fires here locally. When we got here there was a great organizational structure. I'd like to thank the Shasta County Sheriff's Department and especially Shasta Forest here, for their help and effort on this. The local government, OES engines that have helped quite a bit -- we hope to turn the corner in, we think in about 14 days, maybe by July 14th. We hope to see some really good progress, as the Governor has said, by the end of the week. We think we're going to be successful on the Motion, Moon and Deer Lick and we think we're going to go ahead and turn the corner with Whiskeytown National Park.

And I think that says very well for the amount of cooperation and the spirit of cooperation that's here today, that everybody is in this same thing together. So I think it's great that they're all here and we're all communicating and that's the most important thing with this job.

GOVERNOR SCHWARZENEGGER:

Thank you very much, Chief. And General Kight, I would like you maybe to just bring everyone up to date with the National Guard, about our plan of adding more troops. Thank you.

GENERAL KIGHT:

Certainly. Thank you very much. I would like to say that the Governor had talked about the 200 people that we're brining forward to do some of the Type 2 firefighting and I will tell you that the Governor was the first to call us out and we've been -- there are about 440 of us currently on status and we've been on status since June 22nd. So we have been in the firefighting mode, working with our first responders teams. It's been an excellent relationship, as usual in the past. We've got eight fixed-wing aircraft, MAFS units, modular airborne firefighting systems, here. We've got all of the MAFS that are in the Guard here in this state, so right now they're based out of McClellan. We also have seven states' Air Guard units that are also supporting this mission. So we have a lot of support, not only here in California, after the Governor gave us the call, but also other states that are supporting us. So we look forward to the next portion of the mission, also the training. We're ready to go. The people that we have, we take from one capability, they are available and we will train them in this capability and we look forward to our continued support.

GOVERNOR SCHWARZENEGGER:

Thank you very much, General.

GENERAL KIGHT:

You're welcome.

QUESTION/ANSWER:

GOVERNOR: Thank you. If there are any questions about any of this, please feel free to ask any of us.

QUESTION: Governor, you're in, you're out, you're all over the state and all at the same time and I applaud you for that. Would you like to, if you ever get the opportunity, to go out on the actual fire lines themselves?

GOVERNOR: Yes, I have visited some of them. But I think the most important thing that I can do as governor is to make sure that the firefighters have the resources and that everyone is coordinating and is working together, between law enforcement, the fire officials on the state level, federal level and local level. And I think this is why it is very important for me to go around the state to the various different fires, to get the briefings, to always be up to date and then to respond according to what the needs are, if it is a declaration of an emergency, if it is asking President Bush for a national emergency declaration.

All of those things are very important, because what is important is not only to fight the fires as quickly as possible and not to cause any damage or any threats to life or anything like this, but also to rebuild as quickly as possible after the fires. The debris removal is extremely important so that people can rebuild their homes, their structures, all of those things.

So it's a whole follow-through from the beginning to the end and I think that the only way you can do that if you are a governor, if you are leading, is if you understand and if you go to the places and if you hear the briefings and get the firsthand experience and that's what I'm doing all around the state.

So thank you very much. And again, I want to take this opportunity and say thank you, thank you, thank you, to our great firefighters. Thank you very much. And to our volunteers also, thank you very much. (Applause)