A wildfire quickly burned more than 100 acres of heavy vegetation Wednesday in a remote, mountainous area east of San Diego. The fire had potential to grow to 10,000 acres, said Rich Hawkins, a U.S. Forest Service spokesman. Air crews were attacking the flames, but ground crews couldn't reach the fire because there were no roads leading to it.
"It'll be a difficult fire to fight, because you can't drive to it," Hawkins said.
No evacuations were ordered, though the fire was spreading north with the potential to threaten the tiny villages of Corte Madera and Pine Valley, about 40 miles east of San Diego and just north of the U.S.-Mexico border, Hawkins said.
A large plume of white smoke could be seen billowing into the clear blue sky from suburban El Cajon, which borders San Diego.
The cause of the fire was not immediately known.
Earlier in the day, fire crews contained a 430-acre wildfire caused by sparks from a stolen car, a fire spokeswoman said. No buildings were burned.
The blaze in a hilly canyon west of town was surrounded about 8 a.m., although more than 650 firefighters were mopping up hot spots, said Massiel Ladron De Guevara of the California Department of Forestry-Riverside County Fire Department.
Five firefighters were treated for heat exhaustion or ankle injuries since the blaze began Monday afternoon, she said.
It burned parts of a nature reserve.
The fire erupted after sparks from the undercarriage of a speeding car ignited dry brush by the side of the road, authorities said.
Witnesses reported seeing three young men fleeing the scene after the car, which had been reported stolen in nearby Murrieta, crashed into a rock.
No arrests had been made by early Wednesday.
