Santa Barbara Wildfire Threatens Neverland Ranch

A California wildfire in the mountains of Santa Barbara County has ballooned into the largest fire burning in the Golden State right now at 21,763 acres, triggering new evacuation orders and threatening Neverland Ranch, the late Michael Jackson’s infamous estate, officials said.

The Lake Fire ignited on July 5 north of Los Olivos near Zaca Lake amid scalding hot temperatures during a historic heat wave that is expected to persist through the week. A red flag warning will be in effect in the region. 

"A smoke column was visible much of the day as a result of the Lake Fire burning up Figueroa Mountain around the day use area," Cal Fire wrote in its incident report. "There was not significant fire growth today because crews went direct with extinguishing spot fires."

While fog hugged the coast, the cloud cover was far from the mountains where flames have been marching across bone-dry vegetation and was having little impact on the inland areas of Santa Barbara County that have soared into the low 100s in recent days. Figueroa Mountain that's within the fire footprint was forecast to reach a high of 100 to 105 degrees today, said Mike Wofford, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service. 

Fire activity picked up as temperatures increased and a big plume of smoke could be seen on PG&E webcams. "The smoke plume is definitely an indicator of fire activity in the Figueroa Mountain area today," Scott Safechuck, a spokesperson for the Santa Barbara County Fire Department, told SFGATE. Safechuck said the mountain is highly vegetated, and the fire is tearing through all that fuel. 

Safechuck said protection around the ranch includes a crew of firefighters with a fire engine and hose lines, hot shot crews and bulldozers.