oakland, stephanie chuang, cbs 5. >>> thousands of homes near sacramento have been evacuated after a propane tanker caught on fire and officials are fearing an explosion there. and marina men dina reports, it could take hours or days for the propane to burn off. she joins us live from lincoln with the latest. >> reporter: yeah. in fact, a special team from texas flew in here for a pretty delicate operation to remove the propane. we actually saw a bulldozer a live here about an hour ago. what you're looking at is one of the roadblocks set up here in lincoln. the plan today is that these experts from texas will pump the 30,000 gallons of propane from the burning tanker fire car and transfer it into a pond. that's what the bulldozer is for to dig that pond or hole where they will then burn off the propane. now, in a news conference this morning, the fire chief explained what would happen otherwise if they just let the propane burn instead. here he is. >> yes, we do have estimates if we let this thing burn it could last up to three weeks. we can't really have that happen. we have the resources, education and subject matter experts here able to mitigate this incident hopefully within the next 24 to 48 hours. >> re