Update: Berkeley Hills grass fire now contained
Hikers on the Nimitz trail called 911 to report the fire. "We heard a loud, startling explosion around 1:30," one of them told us.
Firefighters are working to contain a 3-acre grass fire in Berkeley near Inspiration Point in Tilden park on Tuesday afternoon, authorities report.
"At this time there is no threat to people or structures," the Berkeley Fire Department said at 2:25 p.m.
Scroll down for an update to the story.
Hikers on the Nimitz trail at Tilden park called 911 to report a grass fire at 1:35 p.m., BFD said.
"The road is closed just past the Tilden Botanical Garden," a reader told us. "Lots of fire trucks. Lots of sirens."
Footage via Alert California
The East Bay Regional Parks Fire Department is in command of the incident with BFD and the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (Cal Fire) supporting them.
BFD urged people seeking official emergency alerts to sign up for AC Alert, "the text, email, and phone system used by Berkeley and Alameda County to push emergency messages. You can also download the Genasys Protect App to be alerted about any status changes or emergencies in areas you care about."
The Scanner will update this report as more information becomes available.
Update, 3:10 p.m. Via BFD: "The fire at Inspiration Point has been contained. East Bay Regional Parks remains in command of the incident. Berkeley Fire crews and other partners will remain on scene to ensure the fire is completely out."
According to reporting on the Watch Duty app, firefighters stopped forward progress shortly before 2:40 p.m. at less than 4 acres: "Resources at scene can handle, canceling the remainder of the response - per Incident Command. Air Attack and all tankers have since been released."
Update, 3:30 p.m. One of the hikers who reported the fire, Daniel Sargent, has just contacted TBS to describe how events unfolded: "We heard a loud, startling explosion around 1:30 PM. We noticed smoke and fire around the base of an electricity pylon a few minutes later and called 911. Readers can draw their own conclusions, but we figured that the explosion was likely a blown transformer and the cause of the fire."
Update, 5 p.m. BFD said Cal Fire will be in charge of the incident going forward. The Scanner will share additional updates as they become available.
