matter what each day brings. so long ou yan say... "i am here." aim to be there more. talk to your doctor about aimovig. moraga. we begin "today in the bay" with breaking news, fire in the hills of moraga, dangerously close to homes. evacuating hundreds. good morning and thanks for joining us. i'm laura garcia. >> and i'm scott mcgrew. the fire burning near st. mary's college on merrill drive and sanders ranch road. >> this map gives you an idea of where it is nestled in the hills of moraga. sanders hill is a gated community, about 400 homes in the area broke out a little bit before 1:00 this morning. it is now 60% contained. more than 100 homes evacuated and the fire itself consumed 60 acres. multiple agencies are on the

scene as well. residents themselves were told to evacuate. pg&e had turned off power to this area about 11:00 last night. people had to evacuate in the dark. they went to st. monica's church not far from the fire scene and that's where we find sharon katsuda live. sharon? >> reporter: good morning. we are here with hundreds of evacuees here in the parking lot of safeway in moraga. with me are some high school students. tell me what did you see first thing this morning? >> i was in my bed and i kind of just heard a bunch of noises. there was nothing really happening at my house. i turned on the flashlight and my room was filled with smoke and i kind of got up and my parents were running around, they woke me up. there was a lot happening. i looked outside and the sky was red. i was shook. >> reporter: it was very close to your house.

you saw the red glow? >> yes. >> reporter: what woke you up, the sirens? >> sirens, honking, my parents -- i don't even know what came first. everything happened so quickly. >> reporter: let me talk to your friends over here, come on in a limb bit closer, i won't bite, i promise. tell me about the situation when up got here. you saw a lot of friends. how did you find out to meet here? >> well, when we got here there were a lot of cars coming down and into safeway and so we figured it was the best place to go because when we had left our house we had no idea where to go. and then right when i got here kate had come over to my car and that's how i saw her. >> reporter: and did you receive any texts from your neighbors, or how did you know? >> i got a lot of texts and phone calls. everyone seemed pretty worried because they knew i did live in sanders ranch. everyone was wondering if i was safe and everyone was worried for each other. >> reporter: you really pulled together. tell me about the sanders ranch area.

a lot of people have taken off and gone back home. they've been told they can. what have you been told? >> we have to wait an hour so they can see what's happening and see if everything is fine. >> all i have are my clothes i have on right now and then my backpack. >> reporter: you're such a good student. school is open. you are planning on going to school what time this morning? >> 8:00. >> reporter: you have tests? >> i have an in-class essay first period. >> reporter: let's listen to what police are saying right now. we have police here approaching the parking lot. >> sanders ranch is still under mandatory evacuation. everybody else can return home.

>> reporter: police just driving through as you're seeing now, the parking lot telling residents to still stay put here. residents have been told they can go back home. tell me about the nixel alert. what about this evacuation? >> i checked my phone and there was nothing. >> reporter: i'm glad we can talk about this and you are okay. >> very relieved we're here and my whole family and three dogs got out. >> reporter: you can see they're sort of in stand by mode right now.

most of the other residents out here, there are hundreds of people here, the parking lot was packed. now it's starting to clear out. reporting live in moraga, sharon katsuda. back to you. >> thanks for the very latest there. it sounds like the sanders ranch area itself still remains under mandatory evacuation orders. it looks like they're getting better containment on the fire. >> early in the morning. let's check in with bob redell. he is on the fire lines just above sanders ranch road. what do you know, bob? >> reporter: you can see i just asked the firefighters behind me, is this the frontline of the fire as far as the fire is concerned and they said yes. there's not much left here as far as what is burning. they've been out here and you get a sense how rugged this terrain is. they've been out here spraying down a trunk burning here and of course just trying to establish a perimeter. what we're standing in is on the side of a ridge, a bowl, and

this is hard ground. looks like it had a lot of dry grass on it. you have these trees here. we have about a dozen firefighters out here. when you come out and see them out here dealing with the conditions you realize what it takes to be a firefighter. it's very steep. the terrain is not very firm. it's easy to slip and you're wearing all that gear and trying to deal with the smoke there. the official number is this fire is at 60 acres and 60% contained. when i spoke with the moraga fire department they expected the numbers to go up once the sun came up. we're standing on the frontline. you can see there is not much here in terms of flames, if anything, just smoke and smoldering remain. i would say for people who are watching who live in the sanders ranch development you should be very happy to see this, to know that there have been no homes destroyed. the homes that are closest to

us, i'm going to say about 50 yards to 100 yards downhill to the left of us. so there's still a lot of brush that would have to burn before it got there. as you can see here they're holding the line. about 150 firefighters out here. one of the firefighters says we have a ton of resources out here. you got the sense they were ready for something like this if it were to happen. it's not only county resources. also cal fire. cal fire had a spotter aircraft up earlier helping them assist in fighting this fire. it started around the 1:00 time frame and that's significant because the power had been out, we believe, for at least an hour already. the fire department doesn't know what caused the fire but something did and looks like right now they definitely got a handle on it. >> that is great news there. and that really gives us a good illustration of what they were up against. a lot of dry vegetation in the area. it's hilly right there above st.

mary's college as well. the campus itself wasn't threatened but, of course, at that residential area as you mentioned, bob. >> reporter: correct. so this is the sanders ranch private development. there's a lot of large homes here and there were about 100 homes we foe thknow were evacua from sharon and conversations with firefighters. there's a v shape of open space. it's a bowl and has a ridge. it went up the ridge and came back down the western side. it looks like the firefighters are doing a good job of keeping it contained. >> your shot is breaking up there. thanks for the great information, bob. we appreciate it. >> let's check in next with kari and how the winds are hindering firefighters. >> reporter: it's good they are getting some containment. we have seen recently high gusts. we just had a gust measured on mt. diablo at 75 miles per hour. sustained winds at 52 miles an hour. and then in the area where we

have a fire in las trampas gusting within the last hour. m. st. helena gusts at 70 with sustained winds at 43. so we are seeing some of those ridge gusts really high at this point. mt. tamm at 35. gusts at about 20 to 50 miles an hour. as we go throughout the rest of the day we're going to see our winds in the valleys still staying very calm and for our higher elevations especially in the north bay we will see the winds staying strong even into the late morning hours. but we are expecting some improvement as we go into this afternoon into the evening. that's when the red flag warning will be dropped as we see winds subside. notice, also, the winds will shift and a southerly wind will bring in slightly more humidity. right now that humidity is very low at about 17% in livermore.

we're staying in that area around moraga, the humidity at about 16%. the very low humidity allows fire to spread. thankfully they got containment there and we don't see anything else going on. mike, you are tracking the roads around the area. >> the merrill fire and here in moraga, highway 24 and 680. we talk about the walnureek interchange and the ctunnel whih remains open. the power shutoff in the area is making it dark and tough for evacuations through the sanders ranch area right here. we are looking here to sanders ranch to the south and evacuation zone here. nearby st. monica's college. the small eaer roadways don't h sensor data.

avoid the area if you don't have to go to that portion. back to you. thank you, mike. we will continue to follow that breaking news out of moraga where the fire has forced evacuations. some people being let back in. in the sanders ranch community, the very latest coming up. deal talk! my new $4.99 blt cheeseburger combo, comes with... 100% beef and hickory smoked bacon, plus fries and a drink all for just the change in your couch. i found the remote! try my new $4.99 blt cheeseburger combo.

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some evacuations are still in effect. firefighters say the fire is about 60% contained. many people were told to go to st. monica's church in that area. the fire itself started after 1:00 in the morning. we spoke to at least one evacuee who said they got a lot of power alerts but no alerts about evacuations. so that was concerning to a lot of people. >> as for the power, let's get to that, the historic bay area power outages. here is a look at the overnight outage map. this was posted about 2:00 in the morning. all the areas in purple are without power. now this is a screen capture because for most of the overnight this has been unavailable on pg&e's website. too many people trying to see it. utility's second round the planned power shutoffs got under way around midnight. pg&e projected another quarter million homes and businesses will lose power in phase two of

the shutoff. this is in addition, of urse, to the hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses already without power in the initial shutoff yesterday. some power actually has already been restored including in the sierra foothills. most homes will be back on line this morning. meteorologist kari hall with a look at the windy conditions. we are seeing high winds across the bay area still keeping up above. in fremont, all calm as we go throughout the day. we'll talk more about this and what's ahead coming up next. the van gogh.

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welcome back to this early edition of "today in the bay." the big story we're covering this morning along with the fire that's burning in moraga, hundreds of thousands of people in the bay area waking up in the dark. >> kris sanchez is in morgan hill. you say the power is out there. >> reporter: the power is out in a large swath of morgan hill. you can't see the pg&e map but we do have one on the nbc bay area website you can consult and the areas in red are the outage areas and there's a lot of red here in morgan hill. there is a curfew here. morgan hill is one of the few communities to enact a curfew for this public safety power shutoff. a lot of folks not super onboard with that. given how dark it is out here on the intersection when the

traffic lights are out, it's probably not a bad thing to limit the number of people who are out on the roadways. ian drove through a neighborhood a few hours ago. you can see how dark it is, it feels like camping out here. before the lights went out folks were scrambling to get ready. >> i mean, i backed up all my batteries, i have lanterns out. even then i don't know how long those will last. >> just power going away. people still have food at home. they can cook with gas. a lot of people have city gas. so what's the panic? >> reporter: they're not used to it, i suppose. the curfew wasn't popular with everybody, but it was effective. coming up in the next half hour i'll tell you about two arrests they made in one of the outage

areas. in morgan hill, kris sanchez, "today in the bay." >> curious to hear about that because there was concern as well. you don't want looters to come out. >> lock your doors, lock everything behind you. that's a concern. we are waking up this morning still breezy in some of those spots especially in the higher elevations and that's exactly where the red flag warning was in effect for elevations above 1,000 feet. the red flag warning will continue as we have gusts at times. a wide look outside in san jose if you're about to head out. skies are clear. not a whole lot of wind here. gusts have topped 75 miles an hour. that was the recent gust at mt. diablo and in rose peak 48 miles an hour there.

a gust of 70 miles per hour reported while in santa rosa it's still breezy there. right now we're seeing the highest gusts in parts of the north bay, up to 20 to 25 miles an hour. you go into the rest of the day, it will still be breezy in some of these areas. as we go throughout the morning. look at what happens as we go into this evening. we start to see the winds shifting more easterly. it turns southerly as we start to bring in slightly more humidity. our hour by hour humidity forecast shows that we'll see still single digit relative humidity numbers through early afternoon. then once we see the winds shifting, the humidity levels will start to go up during the overnight hours and it won't be

as dry tomorrow morning compared to what we are seeing this morning. here is a look at our high temperatures for today. we're reaching up to 80 in san jose. slightly warmer than yesterday. up to 82 in walnut creek as well as livermore and in hayward 79 degrees. also upper 70s in san mateo and san francisco, 77 degrees. you'll feel warmer there as well. sonoma reaching 82 and 83 in santa rosa. we have this storm system causing the gusty winds moving away. there will be another storm system developing on saturday and breezy winds to shift into the bay area. we'll also push down slightly cooler temperatures just temporarily and then as we go into next week watching a third storm system. things are getting active in terms of waves of gusty winds. our seven day forecast shows in san francisco it will be warm for the next couple of days.

cooling down leading into the weekend. mike, you've been tracking the roads. how is it looking? >> a live look at the bay bridge toll plaza. yesterday a very light, early commute. we do have a relatively light commute right now, too. a few more cars stacked up. i'm going to guess they haven't ye opened the rest of the cash lanes. the merrill fire and because of the shutdown of the power outage, contra costa county including the area and the evacuations. the caldecott tunnel remains open. this is just south of st. mary's college. we follow the fire. st. monica's church not far from

the area and this is not affecting highway 24 or 680. that's right in the zone where they have shut down power. we're still following that as a general story as well looking at no problem for the flow of traffic. the lantos tunnel also open. back to you. we'll have more on the fire burning in moraga overnight. a souvenir and handy standby soon to be eliminated. the items found in almost every hotel room in california that will soon be going away. plus, state school districts could get the final say on a controversial proposal. the recent decision by governor newsome that may lift one common campus drug ban. ♪

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4:26 on your thursday morning. you are looking at the moraga fire burning in the sanders ranch area centered around merrill road. a minute ago we heard live broadcasts from the police car saying people living in other areas were allowed to go back home. it was about 60% contained. >> we do know at least 100 homes were evacuated at one point. many people now are gathered at nearby st. monica's church. that fire started a little bit after 1:00 in the morning. we don't know how it started. one evacuee says they received power alerts but no alerts about evacuations. neighbors had been going door-to-door pounding on doors honking horns trying to get everybody out. >> we'll keep an eye on that and other power outages. those small plastic bottles of shampoo and conditioner in hotel rooms soon will not be inside any california hotel room.

governor newsome has signed into law a rule banning tiny plastic bottles in hotels. hotels instead will have to use the refillable dispensers. this applies to all california hotel rooms and takes effect in 2023. schools in california may soon allow medical marijuana on campus. governor newsome also reversed a current prohibition within 1,000 feet of campuses. under the new bill school districts will get to decide if parents can administer it to their children at school. the law is expected to take effect next year. former democratic governor jerry brown vetoed that bill last year. coming up on "today in the bay," we'll go back to the breaking news, the latest massive power outages as well. a lot of people without power this morning. feels very chilly out there in some spots. a live look outside in san jose. it's a clear start and we will have a slightly warmer afternoon. i'll talk about that as well as the winds coming up next.

and we're looking at the nimitz by the coliseum. there, that's what remains of an earlier crash in the middle of the freeway. i believe things are happening. we'll show you the impact of the speed sensors and what else is going on bay area wide. plus, a scary wake-up call for residents in moraga. wildfire forcing evacuations in the middle of the night. we'll have a look at the progress made so far and the people still out of their homes right now. our team coverage next.

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