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BIG SUR (CBS 5 / AP / BCN) ― Approximately 19,000 firefighters were working overtime Tuesday to beat back hundreds of wildland blazes burning from the western edge of the Sierra Nevada to the coastal mountains near Big Sur, where authorities ordered new, mandatory evacuations.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger ordered 200 National Guard troops to report for fire training on Tuesday to relieve weary crews early next week. That marks the first time the guard has been asked to send soldiers to join ground-based fire fights since 1977, a guard spokesman said.

Officials had hoped a soggy fog bank that blanketed much of the Northern California coast Tuesday would help with fire suppression, but the moisture did not extend inland or up to the high elevations where most of the wildfires were burning, said Brian Tentinger, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Monterey.

Even as firefighters gained ground on some of the state's worst blazes, air district officials grew concerned that wind patterns could send more smoke billowing across Northern California and the Central Valley.

Monterey County: Basin Complex Fire

The mandatory evacuation order on a strip of coast near the tourist community of Big Sur covered a roughly 15-mile stretch along Highway 1 where firefighters planned a controlled burn Tuesday evening to help contain a fire that has now burned about 74 square miles, said U.S. Forest Service spokesman Rolf Larsen.

The Basin Complex Fire, burning mostly in the Los Padres National Forest, continued to grow this week and was just 3 percent contained - the same as last week - as it expanded away from populated areas. The mandatory evacuation affected about 200 people who live in an area from Partington Ridge to Limekiln State Park.
 
The evacuated area also included the Esalen Institute, the Big Creek Reserve, the town of Lucia, and the Immaculate Heart Hermitage. Travel in the evacuated stretch of highway was prohibited, fire officials said.

The American Red Cross opened a shelter for the new evacuees at the Pacific Valley School at 69325 Highway 1 near mile marker 13.80, according to fire officials. Information about the shelter was available from the Red Cross Carmel Chapter at (831) 624-6921.

Information about the evacuation of large animals was available from the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals by calling (831) 373-2631 or (831) 646-5534.

The Basin Complex Fire began as two wildfires ignited by lighting June 21 that later burned into a single 39,906-acre blaze, fire officials said. The fire, which has burned 17 structures so far, threatens 1,277 more structures.

At Tassajara Zen Mountain Training Center monastery in nearby Carmel Valley, students and volunteers stretched sprinklers atop buildings in case embers started falling.

Firefighters have poured nearly 1,400 personnel and equipment into the area to ensure the fire does not reach Big Sur, said John Ahlman, a Los Padres National Forest spokesman, and suppression costs had reached $7.9 million. 

In the area, some flames are burning inside steep canyons, where "you've got so much heat it's kind of like in an oven - you're getting heat from both sides of a canyon and kind of toasting the firefighters, so it's not a safe area," Larsen noted.
 
Endangered condors also sought to avoid the flames and thick smoke by hunkering in cliffs along the Pacific Ocean. Scientists were mourning the loss of a two-month-old chick that they say died when the fast-moving fire swept through the gorge where it was nesting in a 1,000-year-old redwood.

Monterey County: Indians Fire

A second fire in the Los Padres National Forest — the Indians Fire — farther inland and in rugged, mountainous terrain, has burned 127 square miles and was 95 percent contained, Larsen said.

"They're making headway because winds are rather calm," Larsen said.

As a result, a mandatory evacuation for residents in the Arroyo Seco Road area, about 12 miles west of King City, has been downgraded to a voluntary evacuation, fire officials said.

The 81,378-acre fire was ignited by an escaped campfire June 8, fire officials said. The blaze is scheduled for full containment Thursday.

The Indians Fire has cost $39.9 million in suppression efforts so far. Two structures have been destroyed, 422 structures have been threatened, and 17 people were injured, fire officials said. 

Shasta, Trinity Counties

Far to the north, the weather service said Tuesday morning brought relatively light wind to the Shasta-Trinity National Forest — where harsh terrain has hampered efforts to battle a blaze there. Temperatures were expected to return to the 80s in the late afternoon.

Crews managed to increase their containment of the forest's 55-square-mile fire, about 35,000 acres, to 36 percent by early Tuesday.

A smaller blaze in the nearby Trinity Alps Wilderness, a popular summer hiking spot, was only 2 percent contained after charring more than 4 square acres.
 
There were a few minor injuries reported among firefighters working on the Shasta-Trinity fires.

Sierra Nevada Foothills 

Two wildfires have choked parts of the Sierra Nevada foothills, sending up plumes of smoke that darkened patches of the 100-mile stretch along the Interstate 80 corridor between Sacramento and Reno.
 
The fires in the Tahoe National Forest blanketed portions of the interstate highway linking the two cities and the foothill communities in between where tens of thousands of people live.

Bakersfield & Fresno Areas

In the Sequoia National Forest east of Bakersfield, crews from as far away as Kansas struggled to contain a 8,200-acre blaze there. Powerful gusts and choking smoke traveling up the steep canyons hampered their progress, and residents of neighboring towns were ordered to evacuate.

The Kiwanis Club of Mariposa, about 70 miles northwest of Fresno, canceled the town's annual fireworks show at the county fairgrounds because firefighters were using it as a staging area to contain a blaze that has burned through more than 2,700 acres.
 
Polluted Air Is Growing Concern

The region's raging wildfires have created a smoky haze so stifling that some doctors in the state's mountain-ringed farm country said their waiting rooms have been crowding with patients struggling to breathe.

Even without the blazes, the farming towns and subdivisions dotting the long, flat San Joaquin Valley are typically shrouded in a layer of smog during the summer.

But airborne ash from the hundreds of lightning-sparked fires caused such a spike in air pollution that meteorologist Shawn Ferreria said it took his breath away.

"I went and bought a mask because my lungs were not happy with me," said Ferreria, a senior air quality specialist for the San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control District. "What we are experiencing is out of historical norms. I thought if I'm going to continue riding my bike to work, I better take an extra measure."

Once the tiny particles of soot - which are blamed for triggering asthma and other respiratory problems - are carried inland, they're sealed in under a layer of warm air created by hot summer temperatures.

"Our waiting rooms are full of people with sore throats, itchy eyes and sniffles," said Kevin Hamilton, a respiratory therapist with Sequoia Community Health Center in Fresno. "It's certainly driving the clinic's appointments up."

Community Regional Medical Center, the area's only trauma center, showed no increase in respiratory cases. Some health professionals suggested that could be because asthma patients stayed inside to avoid exposure.

In the San Francisco Bay Area, local officials said pollution levels had finally returned to healthy levels after several days of health warnings.

Air district officials in San Joaquin Valley said air quality has also improved significantly there since Friday, when ozone in towns scattered throughout the region reached "very unhealthy" levels.

Schools canceled outdoor activities and residents were warned to stay inside with the air conditioner running. For households lacking air conditioners, the district recommended families hole up in local malls.

If conditions worsen, air managers said they may recommend that other local cities cancel their fireworks displays as well.

"Since there's fires to the north, west and east of us we're kind of surrounded," said Gary Arcemont, a meteorologist with the Fresno-based air district. "Depending on what happens with the intensity and the winds in the next few days, we could be breathing the smoke from any of them."

Firefighters Pick Their Battles

The scale of the wildfires burning throughout Northern California have forced firefighters to allocate their resources carefully: they focus on communities in the path of flames, sometimes allowing other blazes to chew through unpopulated forest land, when they judge it is not safe or productive to combat the fires directly.

"They have to choose strategic areas where they feel they can successfully fight fires from," Larsen said.

"It's like eating an elephant - you've got to eat it one bite at a time," added Jason Kirchner, another spokesman for the U.S. Forest Service. "We have to take a step back, figure out where the best place is to make a stand and sometimes wait for the fire to come to us in those situations."

This year is extraordinary for the number of active fires, Kirchner explained. California has had 4,661 fires totaling 351,231 acres to date -- a figure Forest Service officials said appeared to be an all-time record in the state.

Kirchner said wildfires have not been blamed for any significant injuries to civilians or firefighters even though some 660 square miles of land have burned in California this season.

"It is extremely steep, very rugged territory, and there are a lot of injuries, twisting ankles, slipping on hills," Kirchner said. Burning debris is "rolling downhill right past your containment line. It's very complicated, difficult, dirty firefighting work."

Officials said there was a possibility of rain in far northern California this week. But the changing weather pattern also could bring new lightning and high wind, said John Heil, another Forest Service spokesman.

Even a modest rain storm - highly unusual in July - would do little to diminish the likelihood of a long, tough fire season, Heil said.

"Unless it rains, and we get some really good rainfall, you can pretty much expect it to be here right through October," he said.

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