A crew of 700 firefighters on the ground and in the sky, dropping water and flame retardant from helicopters and planes, have “stopped” the advancing flames of a wildfire outside Mount Diablo State Park on Monday evening, according to local officials. The flames leapt up the eastern face of the mountain, consuming 3,700 acres and engulfing the mountain in a plume of smoke.
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The San Jose Mercury News spoke to a veteran firefighter, who has leapfrogged from the blaze in the Sierra National Forest to the “Rim Fire” in Yosemite to the current fire in Mount Diablo State Park with barely a few days of rest in between. “You rely on your training and a lot of coffee,” he told the reporter. “A lot of coffee.”