Fire fighters down and out at The Battle of Blue Cut goes on

"The battle of Blue Cut" in California.

All the ingredients were there. Dry heat, gusting winds in a mountain pass cloaked in dead grass and drought-shriveled chaparral.

All it needed was a spark. It came at 10:36 Tuesday morning near Kenwood Avenue west of Interstate 15. The Blue Cut fire was born.

“It all aligned. The wind, the fuel and the topography,” said Capt. Howard Deets of the Mill Creek hotshot crew based in the San Bernardino National Forest.  "When that happens there’s nothing you can do about it. You could throw the world’s fire fighting resources at it and it's just going to keep going."

That’s what the Blue Cut did, chewing through 25,626 acres by Wednesday night, forcing mass evacuations and shutting down one of the most heavily used routes through the mountains that form the untamed backdrop to the sprawl of the Los Angeles Basin.

Read The Los Angeles Times story - “'We got our butts kicked,' firefighters say as Blue Cut fire defies containment.”