San Jose Fire Department crews at the scene of a grass fire in the San Jose hills near Clayton Road. (San Jose Fire Department Twitter)
SAN JOSE — Local and state fire crews battled to gain the upper hand against a grass fire burning out of control in the hills east of San Jose that threatened multiple structures Thursday.
Units from the San Jose Fire Department and the state Forestry and Fire Protection Department, or Cal Fire, worked to battle the blaze and indicated they were making progress against the blaze.
“Firefighters are on the scene of a Tier 3 vegetation fire near Clayton Road in East San Jose,” the San Jose Fire Department stated on its Twitter feed.
The blaze, which was being called the Clayton Fire, had imperiled multiple structures late Thursday, the state and local fire agencies reported.
“Forward progress of the Clayton Fire has been stopped,” the San Jose Fire Department reported in a tweet at 4:40 p.m.
It wasn’t immediately clear how many structures were in the vicinity of the fire.
The blaze had burned 66 acres as of 5 p.m. on Thursday. The fire was 20% contained at that time.
A Cal Fire helicopter at one point siphoned water out of Lake Cunningham to assist in airdrops to battle the blaze.
The grass fire was reported to be burning near the corner of Clayton Road and Via De La Vista, according to a post on the Cal Fire incident website.
Originally published at George Avalos