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at a building under construction. the massive response we're seeing and the people who have been told to evacuate. >> this is ktvu, fox two news at noon. >> good afternoonlet's begin with that. breaking news on the peninsula. it's in the aa of redwood city. evacuations are unde d to a large fire there. the fireni in the 2700 block of middlefield road. this is in an unincorporated area of san mateo county, right along el camino real. it's a commercial area near the caltrain tracks. we'll go to ktvu. greg lee, you're live in the newsroom here monitoring the very latest. greg. yeah. >> gasia, as you said, a huge response to this fire that's burning at that construction site there on middlefield road. i want to get right to some of the video from the ground. the san mateo county sheriff's office in the last 45 minutes, extending their evacuation orders to include those living on dumbarton avenue from the train tracks to middlefield

road. as you look at the huge plumes of smoke coming from this building under construction, the evacuation orders in addition to those who live nearby on pacific avenue and calvin avenue, if you live in those areas, san mateo county sheriff's office urging you to evacuate immediately. deputies are on scene assisting with those evacuations. video showing that fire actively burning on the side of that construction site. as firefighters work to attack it any way they can. i want to show you the look of this time lapse camera. you can see the smoke from the massive fire just from miles away, winds lifting that smoke across the area. there are reports this is an eight alarm fire. what that means is a huge response, including units from surrounding fire departments, a massive amount of resources trying to get control of this fire. here again, the big headline evacuation orders for this structure. fire that is for people on dumbarton avenue, pacific avenue and calvin avenue. if you're in those areas, evacuate immediately. in the newsroom, greg lee, ktvu, fox two news gasia.

>> greg, thank you. let's head straight out now to ktvu. jesse. gary, you're on the ground there near redwood city in north fair oaks. jesse, what have you learned so far? >> gasia i've learned that this massive fire behind me has sparked smaller fires in the community. and so that's one of the things the menlo park fire department is trying to address, not only the main fire, but several smaller fires that are sparked because it's a little breezy, that's sending embers out into the community. i talked to fire officials who say this started on the fifth floor of a affordable housing complex that is now under construction, or at least it was under construction. you see, it's burning right in front of us. it is a 179 unit affordable housing complex that was started just this year. the fire department says it began on the fifth floor in some insulation that was being installed. and we don't know what touched off the fire, but insulation and other kind of material, you can go up very quickly. and that allows the fire to spread, which is what

happened here. so now firefighters are in a defensive posture trying to prevent this fire from spreading to area homes or some apartments and townhomes very close to this. try to keep it from spreading that way and also spreading to the caltrain tracks. i'm told if you commute by caltrain, you may have a problem this afternoon for the, you know, rush commute home because caltrain service right now is halted because of this fire and may be several hours. so service along caltrain may be affected this afternoon. if you use that again. firefighters with the menlo park fire department are in a defensive posture trying to ensure these flames that you see shooting out of this building don't spread and touch off more of the smaller fires, which they say that is happening. the embers are getting caught into the wind and touching off smaller fires around the area. and so they're trying to address that and try to fight a defensive battle to try to make sure this doesn't get any worse. we will bring you the fire chief's comments coming up

around 1230. garcia will head back to you. >> all right, jesse, if i can just expand on your reporting for a minute, you mentioned a couple new pieces of information that sparked a couple of questions. you said that the fire started on the fifth floor amid some insulation in of insulation. was there work actively being done when the fire started? do you know if anyone was inside the building and were they able to get out? >> well, the building was under construction, so i'm guessing it was work somewhere going on, but i don't know if there were specifically working on the fifth floor and it and like a torch or something touched off the insulation or if there was some kind of wiring that malfunctioned that touched it up. we don't know that yet. we just know that the origin source seems to be fifth floor insulation. again, this is a 179 unit affordable housing complex is called the middlefield junction in north fair oaks, which was approved by the voters in this county to, you know, add to the affordable housing stock in san mateo county. and now

that's lost. so they are trying to keep it from spreading to other buildings. garcia, next, you had another question. >> well, my second question is the fact you said it's windy out there. firefighters have told you that some of the embers from this fire have been picked up by winds and blown to other structures that are now burning. do you know, is this mostly a commercial area? is there residential? what do you know about those other fires? >> there's commercial and residential area. i wouldn't say windy. i'd say breezy is a better, better way to say say it as far as opposed to windy. when you think of what we saw in tracy last night, that was windy. this is more breezy, but the embers are are as you see, the flames continuing to shoot even higher into the sky. those embers are being caught in the breeze and being pushed to other areas, and they're setting off smaller fires, smaller grass fires. so from what i from what i'm told, it's not necessarily structures that are burning, but like grass fires because it's the grass is dry everywhere. and so it's catching grass fires.

okay. >> it really is stunning to see these live pictures that you're you're able to bring us through your camera, but you're there. has the situation changed much? i mean, i know it's been a roaring fire. can you tell if firefighters have made any progress at all? and i know in some cases, and you've covered large fires for years as well. at some point, firefighters say, look, we just have to let it burn. do you know where they are in that process? that firefight? they're they're at the look, we have to let it burn point garcia, because this is too big. >> it's eight alarms. yeah. they i think he said they had 27 engine trucks just here. so this is not a go in and put this out. this is a let's keep this from touching off any more construction. as you see if steve you could pull out a little bit. you see that there is construction, before you know, more construction ahead of the fire scene, there's a crane in view as well. you don't want those kind of things to catch fire. you don't want the crane

to collapse and maybe fall into homes. so that's really what they're trying to do. they're not trying to put this out and save the building. that that's a foregone conclusion. they're trying to make sure a bad situation doesn't get much worse. garcia. yeah. >> and like you said, construction on that, that building only started not even a year ago. all right, we'll have to cut you loose. it looks like they've got the area taped off pretty well. a couple of blocks around the fire, jesse. so we'll we'll let you go to. yes. >> and they're expanding, and they're going to expand the, the footprint and move people back a little bit further as well. >> garcia. and the most important thing other than the building, of course, is this is life. and people are being evacuated in the area of middlefield road. go on people. >> people are being evacuated. yeah, people are being evacuated. and from what i'm told, all the construction workers got out. no firefighters have been injured. so we don't have any injuries or loss of life at this point. obviously, we'll check and try to get updated information as the afternoon progresses. >> okay. jesse. gary. thank you. we'll bring you back. i'm sure as soon as you have new

information. let's get some more information on what's happening there in the redwood city area. by bringing in our meteorologist rosemary oroczo, we saw those roaring flames. it looked fairly windy, but then we also heard jesse refer to it as, you know, certainly not the windstorm that we saw kick up that other fire in the far east bay over the weekend. absolutely >> gasia the winds out, there are about 15mph gusting to close to 20, and we'll pick up a little bit into the afternoon. right now temperatures are right about 70 degrees in that area. we are experiencing a very cool day. so it doesn't, that doesn't have an impact on what the firefighters are doing out there. as far as the temperature. but the winds are carrying that smoke probably in this direction since it is coming from the west, maybe a little bit northwest. so you may have a little bit of drift heading towards fremont, milpitas over towards san jose. and that's going to be the dominant win for the entire day. now, the good news about the wind, at least, is that it carries that smoke away. if we had no wind, if we had an inversion kind of holding that smoke closer to the ground, than we would have a poor air quality

issue right over redwood city, again, that smoke is going to be drifting. and if you do live in areas that are east of the smoke, of course you smell it, you see it, you protect yourself, go indoors. but overall it looks like the conditions not too bad out there , but those breezy conditions, of course, as you could see in that live report from from jesse gary, it does not only fan the flames, but it could create those spot fires and you could see the embers just kind of flying around in the sky. as we were listening and talking to jesse and that live report, outside of that temperatures are expected to remain kind of on the cool side for today. we have another concern that will be coming our way as we head into tomorrow heat advisory for all of our inland north bay. as well as our east bay. and then it expands into the south bay over areas of wednesday. and then it continues until thursday night. does not expire until early friday morning. so that's an indication we are going to see some very hot weather arrive into the bay area tomorrow, lasting all the way through thursday night. and it is something that we'll need to

consider with temperatures going to near 100 degrees, perhaps even a little bit above for some . a better look at what we can expect for today. that heat advisory and the extended forecast coming up. >> rosemary. thank you. we're staying on top of that. breaking news near redwood city in north fair oaks, a building under construction meant to be affordable housing is now in flames. we just heard from a reporter at the scene there, jesse gary said. crews really have no choice at this point but to just let the fire go. you see huge orange flames, thick black smoke. this is the scene in north fair oaks on middlefield road. it's an unincorporated part of san mateo county along el camino real. we're told that there is no one still inside the building. people who were inside were able to get out. it is a chal ing, devel

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are underway due to a fire in north fair oaks near redwood city. specifically, it's in the 2700 block of middlefield road along el camino real, not far from the target and costco there in redwood city. this is video here, taken just minutes ago, a structure fire at a building under construction. san mateo county sheriff's department says people living and working nearby on pacific avenue and calvin avenue should evacuate immediately. evacuations have been extended now to include people living and working on dumbarton avenue from the train tracks out to middlefield road, deputies are on site evacuating

the residents there. people are being told to avoid the area to give fire and other rescue crews the time and space they need to conduct this firefight. we just heard from our reporter on the ground, jesse gary. he says that the winds have picked up embers from this fire and have carried them away from this building that started burning in the past hour or so. we're still working to get an exact cause of the origin of the fire. he did say that it's believed to have started up on the fifth floor, perhaps among amid some insulation insulation. this was going to be an affordable housing building. about 180 units or so of housing just announced one year ago, still in its early construction stages. we're staying on top of the situation, working to get in touch with officials connected to the project itself. there in north fair oaks, jesse gary is on the ground getting more information. as soon as we get updates, we will bring them to you here on this newscast and immediately online. now to politics. as mexico has a new president elect, she's not only the first woman selected for

that job, she also has bay area ties. claudia sheinbaum won in yesterday's election with about 60% of the vote. the former mexico city mayor studied energy engineering at uc berkeley. that's also where she became fluent in english and earned a master's degree. sheinbaum is the first jewish person to be elected president of mexico. she's pledged to continue the populist policies of mexico's current president and her mentor, andres manuel lopez obrador. for the first time, mexican nationals living abroad were allowed to cast votes in a presidential election in person. people lined up at the polls at mexican consulates throughout the country and here in the bay area. we are seeing. we are seeing supporters of sheinbaum chanted her name outside the consulate in san jose. people drove from all over the bay to vote. most waited in line for hours. they say the historic nature of the race motivated them to head to the polls this morning. governor newsom, who met the president elect a few years ago, congratulated her in a post on x, said he's looking

forward to continuing their work together. no more waiting in line at the dmv for things like renewing a driver's license. starting today, the dmv is making that task and several others online only. ktvu allie rasmus explains the changes and why the dmv says it's all about customer convenience and costs. an hour before the concord dmv office opened, people were already lined up waiting to be among the first inside. >> in the days and weeks ahead, the dmv hopes lines like this will become a thing of the past. >> more than 90% of what you need to do with the dmv can be done online or through a different service channel. >> starting today, you will only be able to do most of those tasks online or at a self-service kiosk. all vehicle registration renewals will be done online. most driver's license renewals as well. getting a copy of vehicle registration or driving records online only, as well as replacing a lost or stolen id. the goal is to have fewer people coming in person to dmv offices like this. >> i think that's good. it's

less lines, less waiting. >> people that work full time like it just makes it really difficult. you have to take the time off work. so i think if you could just do it in the comfort of your own home, why not? >> customer convenience is part of the reason for the online shift, but so are the costs. >> we have recently taken some reductions in funding the real id, temporary funding ended last year and there were 1000 positions associated with that funding to help accommodate the reduction in staffing. >> keep things efficient. the dmv is moving more of those simple tasks online. >> i'm an old school and i like to work directly with people, but at the same time, i understand that there's going to be changes in our lives and we just need to understand that. and even in whatever, even if i don't like it, there is nothing we can do about it. >> if you don't have internet access at home. the dmv also has self-service kiosks inside the offices and at grocery stores. >> these kiosks will many of them take cash or cash paying

customers in addition to cards? i think once people try online, they'll never go back. >> for some dmv tasks, you'll still need to come into an office in person to get a federally approved real id. for example. most of the paperwork for that can be done ahead of time online, but you do need to come in to take a photo and provide a fingerprint in concord. ali rasmus, ktvu, fox two news. >> for a full list of where you can find a kiosk near you, head to our website ktvu.com. straight back to our bay area weather. i know tomorrow and for a big warm up, but winds continue to be an issue in parts of the bay as we see some breezy conditions in the scene of the fire near redwood city, out where we've seen jesse gary reporting. rosemary. >> yes, garcia. the element that is providing us with this cooler weather and the cloudier weather around the bay area, also bringing us that breezy weather and that's going to continue into the afternoon as usual. we see an uptick in the winds during the second part of the day. and then they begin to ease up as we get closer to sunset.

here's a live look from ktvu over towards the san francisco, where you can see some low clouds out there, in addition to mid and high level clouds, those high level clouds coming from the north. i'll show you the system here in just a moment. checking in on the air quality. because as we've been talking about with that breaking news out towards redwood city, a lot of smoke coming off of that building there. and right now air quality around the bay area is reported. good everybody in the green here, but it's a westerly wind, which means if you are on the east side of redwood city, you may experience a little bit of smoke. if you do. as you know, try to avoid it. get indoors if you can. although we're seeing that smoke go up and then get kind of caught up in the upper level wind. so hopefully it's carrying away most of all that hazardous smoke that is coming off of that building. here's a look at storm tracker two. we've got a very active pattern over the pacific northwest and into canada, the intermountain west. we are just on that southern edge and that's what's giving us the cloud cover , the mild conditions which are right about seasonal for this

time of year, and the breezy conditions as well. fairfield reporting at 18mph, concord is gusting to 28. we have novato sustained at 16 but gusting to 23, shifting over towards the peninsula. sfo reporting winds to 20. palo alto 12 and then in towards livermore, 13 reported for you most areas are within a few degrees of yesterday, some a tad warmer, some a tad cooler. 58 right now, in the city of san francisco, the inland east bay 69 in livermore and in the north bay 63 reported in novato. here's a view of all that cloud cover out there for the afternoon. notice it does begin to break away, but we will continue with low clouds at the coastline and partly cloudy skies into the evening hours there. as we get closer to sunset, we begin to see those changes, though, for tomorrow and that is again going to lead us to near record breaking heat from tuesday through thursday afternoon. highs for today very much average 64 in san francisco, low 70s in oakland, upper 70s for livermore, upper

70s for you. santa rosa and 76. the afternoon high in san jose a for areas over redwood city right about 70 degrees right now going into the upper 70s. for the second part of the day, our inland east bay, 80 degrees in antioch and 78 expected in napa, a robust warm up that begins tomorrow again moving all the way through about thursday. but then we cool it down for the weekend. a better look at what we can expect in the coming days. coming up gasia. >> all right, rosemary, thank you. let's get straight back to that breaking news here. that huge fire burning right now in san mateo county in north fair oaks, at a building that was under construction, meant to be about 180 units of affordable housing. let's bring in on the phone. if we have him. supervisor david canepa from san mateo county, are you with us? supervisor? >> hi, michaela. how are you doing? >> it's good to talk with you again, supervisor. i know you're heading to the scene. i know you've seen the pictures. what's your immediate reaction to what's happening? >> look, first of all, people, safety is paramount. and so i would encourage everyone to make sure that they listen to fire department, police department,

they're their, you know, their observations. they're trained for this, very well trained. please, listen to their instructions, make sure you're safe and, this is really, this is really an intense fire, the winds, as you mentioned, are really, really high. and so we want to make sure that people are as safe as possible and hopefully this fire doesn't spread because of its intensity. >> yeah, yeah, certainly people's lives over property. >> we did hear from our reporter at the scene that the winds were picking up embers and taking them away from the original fire site. the story deepens a bit here. supervisor as you know, the fire is at a building that was under construction, was supposed to be a 179 unit affordable housing project known as middlefield junction there in north fair oaks. i just, you know, pulled up the old news release. it hasn't even been a year that the building has been under construction. what sort of blow is this to those efforts? >> yeah. i mean, you think about

the affordable housing crisis that we were here in the bay area and this housing was just so vitally, vitally important. not only was it affordable housing, but there was going to be childcare. additionally, there was going to be, you know, community, open space and in this particular area, north fair oaks, it's a rather dense, area, just a lot of people, multifamily housing, apartments. and this housing was, you know, is desperately needed, first and foremost, though, i want to make sure that people safety especially we have an existing fire right now. my understanding it's gone to eight alarms, really makes sure that our first responders that, you know, they're safe, want to make sure that the community is safe. but in terms of the project itself, to see this up in flames is obviously, something that is tragic. >> yeah. >> i don't know how closely you're you're tied to the building. do you know, is this a situation where there was work in and on the building every single day, you know, i don't have the details of that. you

know, once the menlo park fire department, sort of works everything out. i don't know what the details of what was happening in the project, the development of the project and who was working there, i just don't have that information. >> okay. >> no, i understand that. is there anything you would like to add? i know sometimes officials get more information than we're given here, you know, in reporter wise. and we do expect to hear from, i think, menlo park fire and the san mateo county fire department here in minutes. is there any information you have that you'd like to share? >> the information i would just share is, and reinforce, please, you know, listen to the first responders that are on the scene or or my understanding is, is that there there may be a potential evacuation. the first thing that they should do is really listen to those fire responders. they've been trained , rigorously. they understand what's going on and really just listening to them and understanding what's happening. and if they tell you and they give you instructions, make sure

to adhere to them. >> yeah. >> and we'll just underscore again that san mateo county sheriff's department did put evacuation orders in place specifically for people who live near middlefield road on pacific avenue. and calvin avenue. then they extended those orders to include people living on dumbarton avenue from the train tracks to middlefield road. and i'll also note if people are just working in the area or shopping in the area, this affects you. you know, even if you just happen to be there this early afternoon, you're being told to get out. all right. supervisor canepa, it's good to talk with you. i wish it were under different circ*mstances, but thank you for your time. >> me as well. gasia. thank you. all right. >> we'll talk again soon. we continue to stay on top of this breaking news. a major fire there on the peninsula near redwood city in north fair oaks. flames started inside a building that's under construction. what was said to be almost 200 units of affordable housing. this is a huge loss for the community, but also right now, people's lives are in danger and that's why evacuations are underway. we'll stay on top of

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live at the scene here. we expect to hear from officials with menlo park fire and also county fire leaders as well. right

>> god said, yeah, good afternoon again to you. and just in a few minutes, we're going to have the undersheriff of san mateo county, as well as the chief of menlo park fire that are going to come and talk to us. before that, though, let me show you the progress they've made. just like i said, we talked maybe, what, 12, 15 minutes ago? you can see that the flames that we saw last time you looked at the picture, they have been knocked out. and so you see a lot of smoke, gray smoke and ash, gray smoke and dark gray smoke. but the flames have been knocked out. so up to upwards of 27 fire engines on this eight alarm fire have done work in knocking down the flames and keeping them trying to keep them from spreading to nearby construction sites and also homes which are off to the left side of your picture, just beyond the tree line. this started, we're told, on the fifth floor of an affordable housing complex that was under construction here in san mateo

county. 179 units happened on the fifth floor in what was described as insulation. now, we don't know what touched off the insulation, whether it's a welder's torch, whether it's a wire, a malfunctioning wire, etc. we don't know that. we just know that's the ignition site was on the fifth floor inside insulation and it spread, engulfing this. this what was to be affordable housing complex here in san mateo, unincorporated san mateo county. again officials with the sheriff's department and menlo park fire, which has this little

area as part of their coverage area. they're going to talk to us and give us an update on on how the firefighting efforts are going. but as you can see, the large flames that were visible earlier in this hour, garcia, are gone. and now we're just seeing a lot of smoke for those of you who use caltrain, this could impact the evening commute on caltrain along the peninsula. please bear that in mind, garcia. >> jesse gary will break you loose so you can monitor that news conference as soon as it starts. thank you for your reporting on the ground. now let's focus more on the project that has been dramatically affected by today's fire. there at that building that was under construction, i'd like to bring in the president of the board of supervisors for san mateo county, warren slocum. mister slocum, i understand this fire is happening in your district. this was one of your projects. >> yeah, that's that's absolutely true. i've been working on this project for ten years now, and it's just a sickening tragedy to watch it go up in flames like this. >> what are you thinking? as you see, not only progress halted,

but also rolled back. >> oh, i'm just heartbroken about it because you know, it was 179 units of affordable housing, one, two and three bedroom units, which is unusual because, three bedrooms are not normally included in affordable housing developments. there was a child care facility, community meeting rooms. so it's a it's a tragedy for the community. it's a tragedy for the developer. and a tragedy for the county. it's just. i'm just sickened by it, and i can hear it in your voice. >> have you even started to think about what comes next in the process? yes. >> i'm sure what comes next in the process is, insurance claims and all that sort of process, and i don't i don't look to this thing being built, being rebuilt in the next, couple of months. so, yeah, we'll see.

>> when was it supposed to be done? >> next year. toward the toward the end of the year. next year. and as i say, we've been working on it for ten years, which is incredible. >> yeah. and it's incredible because in those ten years, the housing crisis has dramatically worsened, are you determined to rebuild? >> i am determined to rebuild. the unfortunate thing is, i'm leaving office at january, and hopefully i can get things moving before then, i'd hate to leave it to the next supervisor for those who aren't for those. >> and just so you know, i'm stuttering a minute here because i just got news that we're going to be hearing from fire officials in about a minute and a half. so i'll ask you one last quick question for those who look at a building and say, my gosh, how and why could it even take ten years to start to get something like this off the ground? what's your answer, financing of affordable housing developments has gotten extremely complex, and a lot of

the time between then and now has been spent on putting together the financing. that's one of the problems in california is it just takes so long to build affordable housing. >> so, so fair to say you're back at step one, or can you just carry over some of those plans? >> no, i think we're back to step one. yeah. we have to regroup and rethink and go on from there. >> so if you had to guess when that building would be rebuilt, barring any further setbacks, i mean, is it going to be another ten years? >> i, i really can't answer that. >> it's impossible for me to know. i can't say, wow, this is really difficult news. >> certainly for those people and families in particular who were waiting for, you know, waiting for those units to come online. i see you, you know, you only sent out the news release less than a year ago last june. so i appreciate your time. like i said, i can tell it's a very heavy day. is there anything else you'd like to share before

we have to let you go? >> i would just, ask that people , you know, at least they think emergencies can't strike to be prepared. yeah. be prepared. >> a good reminder for us all. san mateo county supervisor warren slocum, i appreciate your time. thank you for joining us. >> thank you. bye. >> let's get to that news now from fire officials. we'll listen in as to what they have to say. >> lorenzen i'm the fire chief of the menlo park fire protection district, we are at the scene of a commercial structure fire at 2700 middlefield road. this is an area of north fair oaks. it's an unincorporated area of the county that the menlo park fire protection district, protects, along with san mateo county sheriff, we had a reports of a structure fire on the fifth floor of a building under construction at approximately 1015, reports initially were a fire in the insulation. we got on scene and found thick black smoke emanating from the fifth floor. immediately it was escalated to a third alarm, the

building had been evacuated by all the construction workers that were already on scene, right now the fire stands at eight alarms. that's 26 fire engines, seven ladder trucks. we also have ten mutual aid fire engines responding to us immediate need from santa clara county, kind of as a contingency plan, right now, the building that the fire was involved in looks like it's going to be a total loss. our goals right now are to prevent fire spread to the adjacent occupancies. there's still one under construction. and then immediately to the south, the neighborhoods and the homes over there. we have structure protection forces in place. there's probably at least a dozen small little spot fires they've been dealing with on roofs, fences, grass, lots. so right now that's our current plan. no injuries as of this moment. and with that, i'm going to turn it over to assistant sheriff monahan with san mateo county sheriff. >> thank you, everyone. good afternoon, i am ryan monahan

with the san mateo county sheriff's office. i am the assistant sheriff, and i'm here on behalf of sheriff christina corpus. today so our role in this is to support fires efforts, primarily in ensuring evacuation and safety for the folks in the immediate area. so when the call came out, our deputies were immediately dispatched to the area, they responded to the scene. we sent deputies from bureaus all over the county. so we had not only deputies that are assigned to the north fair oaks area, but deputies assigned throughout our county immediately start responding. when we learned of the alarm and the structure that was involved, deputies quickly got here to the scene. they assessed the need for evacuation, worked with our partners at fire. we set up a unified command post with the fire department so that we could work collaboratively with them and assist them in safety measures. so once we got here, we realized that we were going to need assistance, we're very fortunate here in san mateo

county that we have a very, very strong, allied allied agency partnerships. and we were able to reach out to those allied agencies in the area, and they immediately sent resources to assist us with the evacuation efforts. as of right now, we have an estimated 50 people or so residents from the adjacent area or in the general vicinity that some of them were evacuated for precautionary reasons because of their proximity to the fire, some of them were evacuated because of some of the embers that spread and touched some other locations in the area. so right now we have those folks evacuated. we're very happy to say that those folks are safe. that's our primary concern here, is making sure that our community members here are safe, and our emergency services bureau, we have that helps with these types of incidents is working right now, hand in hand with the department of emergency management, which is a county department, to find a suitable evacuation point or location for our evacuees to go

so they can get the resources that they need. so we're working diligently behind the scenes right now, and we'll be providing updates on where that location is. we're just asking the public right now. the fire's doing an out fire department, is doing an outstanding job right now, controlling and containing this this fire. and so our primary goal here is we want to keep our community members safe. and so we're asking you all in order to do that, to please stay out of the area, please let the fire, fire department personnel, our deputies and all the rest of the first responders out here that are committed to the safety of this scene, do their job, and we will be providing updates. in a very timely manner to keep people up to date on the evacuations and any other information. thank you. do you can we ask you a couple of quick questions? >> looks like from a layman's viewpoint that you're making progress also from from this vantage point, it looks like three buildings you talked about

two. >> it looks like. >> can you clarify that for us as well? >> sure. >> and yes, we are making good progress on it. yeah. it's basically burning all the wood timbers and members, structural members from the interior out. so the fire started on the north end of the building and then was pushed by the winds basically all the way over to this side. i know from here it looks like there's multiple buildings involved. it's one building that looked like it was either an l shape or kind of a u shaped building. so and then there's a building in the, in, you know, closer to us that's also under construction. that one is not involved. we're working on structure protection with that also. so it's just one single building that's been involved. it's just a rather large building. >> the difficulties you're having, we're seeing scaffolding falling of what are what are some of the big issues you guys are having. sure. >> right. the big the big challenge is initially are you know there's no firewalls in there. they haven't been constructed yet. so it's just a tinderbox. and the fire spreads pretty quickly. we had some

decent winds kind of pushing the fire through the building. we recognized early on that this was going to be an exterior attack, as we called defensive, because the just there's almost no way to stop it. and we want to ensure that we don't harm our firefighters also. so, yeah, that's our current plan is to stay back far enough. so if it collapses, we're out of the collapse zone, it's one thing we don't want to do on a on a building that's already been determined. a loss is to, you know, hurt anybody, injure anyone. and so, just like i had said earlier, exposures are our primary goal. protecting those. that's the building under construction. and then the neighborhood just to the south. >> talk to me a little bit more about the spot fires that you say you're fighting. sure where exactly are they? if you know and what mutual aid did you get from and from what? >> oh, sure. yeah as the sheriff was saying earlier, you know, our mutual aid system up here is very robust. the initial response from all of our, allied departments in san mateo county was robust. that's where the 26

engines and seven ladder trucks came from is all just here. internally, we have the ten additional engines coming from a mutual aid partner, santa clara county to the south, what was the rest of your question? oh the spot fires? yeah, the spot fires in the neighborhood. it's interesting. i was walking over through there and there was large pieces of insulation that had melted, were on fire, caught , you know, part of that thermal column and floated into the neighborhood and were causing fires anywhere in in a grass lot in somebody's, collection of items. they're on roofs, you know, and it was just kind of indiscriminate throughout the, the community over here. so those are the spot fires that we're dealing with. >> and you said fire in the insulation was the first report, obviously, to really tell the cause, but are you still thinking that it was, you know, not a piece of equipment that was left on or connected? >> well we'll see. yeah. that we have fire cause investigators out here right now. hopefully there were eyewitnesses to it that will be helpful for us in

determining the cause. those were just the initial reports, whether they're accurate or not. i can't attest to those. but those were the initial reports. so and as we know, on a construction site, there's usually quite a bit of equipment. sometimes there's hot work going on. so but we'll do a thorough, diligent investigation and report back to you when we have a cause. was fully operational and working at the time? >> yes. can you talk? >> and you kind of touched on this, but just how dangerous the risk of embers spreading is. and when we just saw worst case scenario with that yesterday. sure. >> i mean what we were dealing with here, it's very interesting, typically on a, on a large structure fire, we're not dealing with structure protection in the neighborhoods next door, but it's, you know, it reminds us a little bit of fire season and wildland fires, the embers, whether they're from insulation or from vegetation, really worked just the same. and so here we are, in the middle of a urban suburban area, dealing with what we saw yesterday in san joaquin valley is, yeah, a fire spread through ember, embers and winds. so those are

obviously our two biggest threats right now. >> what can you tell us, if any of the if any of the scaffolding is falling, any of the planks, is any of that collapse? >> i think some of it has not very much of it at risk with the crane, whether or not any of the scaffolding has come down and with the crane, is that like a risk also, with fire burning around it? there's not there's not a current risk. it would be a big risk if the fire spread to that building that the crane is next to. okay. so the crane is with the building that is not the right. the crane is in the uninvolved. it may still be a housing building, but it's in an uninvolved, separate building. >> last question. there were any workers inside the building when the fire started, as far as i could tell, when i got here, they were all evacuating. it looked like there was well over 100 construction workers. so i would imagine there were like i said, we'll see whether or not we had any eyewitnesses to the fire start. >> thank you all. >> thank you. thank you folks.

spanish is right here. yep >> i'll switch it over to spanish. so whoever is, when i started this venmo javier acosta , sargento con el listening in to redwood city area officials there. >> san mateo county fire. also the menlo park fire protection district chief, laying it out in very basic terms here. he called it a tinderbox. birx the building that was under construction that has now gone up in flames. there were no firewalls just yet, so he called it a tinderbox in there. he said, it looks like it's going to be a total loss. just sort of reiterating what our reporter on the ground, jesse gary, told us about half an hour ago. the firefight started around 1015 this morning, got the first calls about a fire situation in that building under construction , believed to have started in some insulation. there was thick black smoke coming from the building, quickly went to three alarms and is now eight alarms. all the construction workers who were inside at the time have made it out safely again. the building itself is a total loss. the number one priority, of course, is protecting life,

getting the people who are inside the building out, protecting those who live and work around it. we heard the fire officials say that about 50 people in the area of the burning building have been evacuated as a precaution. there is concern about embers being carried by brisk winds and starting fires in other places. so again, 50 people now out of their homes evacuated due to this fire. it was a roaring fire for the past, you know, two hours plus here and in just the recent 15 minutes or so, we saw the flames really, really die down. but boy, the damage has been done. i have a little bit of new information i'd like to pass on to you. and this is for families who have children, who go to school in the north fair oaks area, this is for garfield community school. it's a k through eight school. more than 500 students go there. there is a notice on garfield's website that says due to smoke from a fire on middlefield road, they're dismissing school early today for the safety and well-being of both students and staff. families are encouraged to come and pick up their children as soon as possible, but if you cannot race over

there immediately, children are being held indoors in a safe spot. they're being supervised. they'll be okay until you can get there. but again, keep in mind at this point, community school, garfield community school is being dismissed early because it is there in north fair oaks and so close to that scene of that huge fire. this is video that was taken earlier in the morning. it doesn't look like this now, but we're sharing it again so you can get a good understanding of just how fierce this fire was. i'll be honest, i can't think of the last time i've even heard of an eight alarm fire, so for it to go to that degree. so quickly, the eight alarm speaks to the size of the fire, but also the amount of mutual aid that is needed. and people agencies from across the peninsula came in to help again, this video here, taken earlier in the morning. the fire started at about 1015. so we're 2.5 hours in here. it's a completely different situation now. but again, the damage has been done. it was a building under construction. what was going to be 179 units of affordable housing for individuals, for families. we talked with the supervisor in charge of it a minute ago,

supervisor slocum. he said he's been working for ten years to get this building off the ground. and you could hear just, you know, sort of the emotion in his voice, looking at the reality of what's unfolding here on our tv screens as we watch this together. so if there is any good news to pass along in this, it is the fact that there have been no injuries reported, no loss of life as a result of this raging fire. i just got a text from jesse geary. he said that there were 100 construction workers inside the building at the time the fire started, so the fact that all 100 were able to make it out safely, that is something that we should definitely note and, you know, celebrate if we can. but again, it is it is a very, very difficult situation here. we're going to bring you more updates on this breaking news. again, it's north fair oaks near redwood city. there in san mateo county, if you smell smoke, it's because of this large fire that is now under control. the building itself is a loss, but we're not seeing those leaping orange flames as we have for much of the morning. we'll have another live update for you today at 130 on ktvu. as soon as we get new information like the

early dismissal for garfield community school, we pop that up online as well. we have you covered. we'll stay on this breaki n s on he

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up above the low clouds, mid and high level clouds. and here's a view of storm tracker two where you can see widespread over the bay area. those clouds coming from a system moving through the pacific northwest. even providing some wet weather to areas like washington, oregon, idaho and then slipping in to the intermountain west. this will change starting tomorrow. there's a look at the pattern. right now you can see the blues and the greens indicating that wet weather we just saw. here's the ridge that is going to be strengthening and bringing us the hot weather tuesday, wednesday. by thursday we do notice a little bit of a south southwesterly flow here. and that is going to help bring our temperatures down. still going to be hot, especially inland. but it looks like tuesday. wednesday look to be the warmest day with temperatures peaking on wednesday. and then into the weekend. we have a comfortable pattern with temperatures back to where they should be for this time of year. so for today, we're calling for the cloudy skies, the mild conditions, and the breezy conditions out there. and then into tuesday. wednesday, some of the hotter

days. we spoke about it in the last half hour. we have a heat advisory for our inland north bay hills and mountains starting tomorrow morning for our inner east bay as well starting tomorrow morning. and then we'll expand to the santa clara valley on wednesday morning. so two or when? tuesday, wednesday and thursday again. look to be the hottest days. that advisory does not expire until midnight thursday into friday morning. just an indication of be careful , you know, be careful out there. avoid the heat if you can, during the afternoon when we of course are seeing it peak outside right now. not bad. 58 degrees in san francisco to mid 70s in brentwood, and then checking in on the winds once again, keeping in mind we've been tracking the breaking news in redwood city that fire there. the winds are anywhere from 15 to 20mph right along the peninsula. could be a little breezier at times as we get into the afternoon. if you are on the east bay side, you may see some of that smoke drifting your direction as well as over the south bay. and if you do just be aware of it, avoid it if you

can. right now, air quality across the bay area looks good to moderate 77 the afternoon high in redwood city for today 78 in napa. upper 70s to about 80 degrees inland by tomorrow. significant changes coming our way. 10 to 20 degrees of warming expected on tuesday when our inland cities near 100 degrees expected to hit it on wednesday, perhaps breaking a few records out there. we do begin to see temperatures trend downward on thursday, but notice still quite hot, especially for inland cities into the weekend. looking better. low 80s expected saturday sunday for inland cities. low 70s around the bay low 60s at t (♪ ) why did i keep missing out on this? before you were preventing migraine with qulipta? do you remember the pain, the worry, the canceled plans? and look at me now. you'll never truly forget migraine but qulipta reduces attacks making zero-migraine days possible. it's the only pill of its kind that blocks cgrp and is approved to prevent migraine of any frequency. to help give you that forget you get migraine feeling. don't take if allergic to qulipta.

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the building housing the israeli consulate will go to ktvu christien kafton on montgomery street in the city. how many protesters are we talking about

here? >> well, at this point, we don't know exactly how many protesters. we're going to give you a quick live look right now. you can see the vans here that the police have moved in. they've actually started in the last hour, removing the protesters who were inside the building. you can see those evidence markers in the back of that white van right there. there's another police van adjacent to it. so, so far, we've seen more than a dozen protesters brought out of the building. now, we do have some video of what it looked like earlier as those pro-palestinian protesters occupied the building , we could see in through the front doors those protesters arriving here sometime, before, 915 this morning, those protesters saying that they were going to occupy that building to send a message that they were willing to put themselves on the line to end the conflict, conflict between israel and gaza and end us support for israel. >> the israeli consulate, zionist organizations that support this genocide, the us government offices and elected officials should expect to be

disrupted as they continue to be complicit in a genocide that has killed over 40,000 people, coming back to our live shot, we are just adjusting that shot to try to give you a slightly better angle. you can see that other, police van there that they are loading the, protesters who occupied the building in which the israeli consulate is located. we are waiting for more of those protesters to be brought out of the building. at this point, there is no word on how long all of this is going to take, or exactly how many occupied the building. we will try to get more information. we'll bring the very latest to you, tonight at four and five on ktvu, for now, we are live in san francisco. christian captain ktvu fox two news, an active scene. >> christian. thank you. let's head straight out past the east bay here to the area near tracy where fire crews have the corral fire 75% contained. this is the fire that popped up over the weekend and grew exponentially,

burning more than 14,000 acres, an area about the size of the city of walnut creek. flames started saturday afternoon amid very windy conditions. more than 400 firefighters responded at one point. interstate 580 was closed in both directions. evacuation orders have now been downgraded. some partial road closures are in place. some good news there from the very far east bay, livermore tracy area, straight back to the peninsula, if we can, for one more last live look at a changing situation. thankfully, near redwood city, this is north fair oaks. the fire is now out, but crews very much on the scene of what was a massive fire at a multi story building that was being constructed for low income housing. the building itself a total loss. an update for you live at 130 here (crowd clapping) (upbeat music) - [narrator] can you guess what this is? ♪ hey hey hey ♪ if you guessed baked beans, then you'd be a great contestant on pictionary. (crowd clapping) our first celebrity captain you love as the co-host of american ninja warriors. he's the bruce lee of sketch, akbar gbajabiamila.

and with him are aaron and his wife mindy. our other celebrity captain

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