Fire evacuees return home in S. California

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. (AP) — Thousands of evacuees began returning home Saturday as a blanket of cool, moist air flowing in from the ocean brought a dramatic change, taming the wind-driven wildfire that had burned 80 homes along the outskirts of town.

Cheers erupted at an evacuation center when Santa Barbara County Sheriff Bill Brown announced that mandatory evacuation orders for most areas were being downgraded to evacuation warnings, meaning residents could return but would have to remain alert.

More than 30,000 people had been under mandatory evacuation orders dating back as far as Tuesday afternoon, when the fire erupted just above Santa Barbara on the face of steep Santa Ynez Mountains. An additional 23,000 had been on evacuation standby.

Notorious local winds known as “sundowners” sweeping from inland and down the face of the mountains drove the fire into outlying neighborhoods Wednesday afternoon, causing most of the destruction, and again late Thursday and early Friday.