Scorching heat fuels Los Angeles wildfires

By Mary Milliken

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Firefighters battling four wildfires around Los Angeles saved hundreds of homes in an affluent coastal community but struggled against a larger fire coming down the mountains toward another exclusive suburb.

With temperatures in excess of 100 Fahrenheit (37 Celsius), flames flared above La Canada Flintridge, 12 miles from downtown Los Angeles and home to NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Nearly 900 homes were evacuated and 1,500 acres had burned in two days.

"It is very active but hasn't reached the neighborhoods yet," said Gabriel Alvarez of the U.S. Forest Service.

Aircraft dropped water and retardant on the steep terrain, while some residents stayed behind to hose down roofs, trees and lawns of multimillion-dollar homes.

California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger declared a state of emergency for Los Angeles and Monterey counties due to wildfires that have burned 13,000 acres.

More than 1,000 residents from the coastal enclave of Rancho Palos Verdes were allowed to return home by midday after a fast-moving fire late on Thursday forced the evacuation of 650 homes. Some 230 acres had burned with 70 percent of the fire contained.

"We were very fortunate that the head of the fire ... was stopped at the backyards of those homes," said Los Angeles County deputy fire chief John Tripp.

Two more large fires burned further inland, making this week the worst conflagration in Los Angeles since November 2008, when multiple fires burned hundreds of dwellings.

But unlike that episode, firefighters were benefiting this week from low winds as they battled in the steep, brittle brush that has seen no measurable rainfall since early June.

(Editing by Dan Whitcomb and John O'Callaghan)