But first escaping the were trapped. Flames. Tonight inside those daring reporter while multiple agencies are making sure there helicopter rescues near yosemite are no hikers still trapped in the fire zone, those who were c. I was a little bit anxious because you dont know how rescued, are grateful. Quickly its coming up the hill. Were just so lucky and two people from the bay area with stories to tell after being fortunate to have made it out and to have been helped by all airlifted to safety by the those amazing, amazing people. National guard. Reporter in the south bay, tonight we have that inside ian cull, nbc bay area news. Story of those helicopter were seeing dangerous fire rescues. Among the 200 people who were weather across much of the state. Here in the bay area, the heat and the wind and the smoke rescued, some hikers from the bay area who didnt know if they remain a big concern. This is what it looked like all would make it out alive. Their Labor Day Weekend road afternoon across the region. Trip turned into a nightmare as difficult to see much of they were trapped at shaver anything. Now, tomorrow will be our 23rd consecutive spare the air alert. Lake. Nbc bay areas ian cull has their story. Reporter there are at least a busy night of course with 13 people from the bay area who had to be rescued from the creek chief meteorologist jeff ranieri. And, jeff, we saw all that haze, fire, including ken oliver, who but at the same time you was flown out by helicopter. We talked with him here in couldnt really smell the smoke, so it was very confusing. Morgan hill minutes after he finally made it home safe. As the walls of flames from the it really was today, and we creek fire in the sierra still think as we head through tomorrow, were going to have National Forest broke out, ken some unhealthy air at times and oliver was in the middle of the also some moderate air. Woods with two friends, hiking its going to really kind of go back and forth as we have so towards safety. Still youre cut off, and ton many large fires burning outside about that. Of the bay area that have really reporter they went back shey erupted over the past 72 hours. Lets start off with a look at the red flag fire warning. This is for the north, east, and the south bay hills at 1,000 feet and above. We could have isolates gusts overnight coming out of the northeast. What about the fires . Again, three large fires outside of the immediate bay area. One of the ones that has seen some of the most explosive growth is the creek fire to the south of us. 143,000 acres and these are contributing to the smoke we have been seeing in so air quality right now is good to moderate, and a few spots unhealthy like concord and livermore. Well explain more about this air quality and why were seeing this smoke but were not smelling it as bad and whats ahead for tomorrow. Ill have that in about 15 minutes. At this hour, thousands of people and businesses in the north bay are in the dark. This is the pg e outage map. You notice those purple triangles. Those represent the outage zones. Calistoga and santa rosa among the cities hit. Pg e cut power to reduce the risk of one of its lines sparking a wildfire. Tonight people are taking matters into their own hands. Nbc bay areas Terry Mcsweeney is in santa rosa for us with the details. Terry. Reporter yeah, and some good news, raj. In the past hour or so, the power has begun to come back up on summerfield rose in the eastern part of santa rosa. It wasnt supposed to come back up until tomorrow morning. The only place that had any power was marys pizza shack, and thats because of a lot of planning and bringing out their own power supply. Hot pizza, cold drinks, plenty of everything at marys pizza shack tonight, including plenty of customers. Marys management knew a psps was coming and months ago they cooked up a plan that included this powerful generator. Its powering most everything including our critical equipment like our walkin, our refrigerators, lighting, things to keep our guests safe and our product at temperature. There are some things even this generator cant do like power the internet. That affects our phone calls and our ability to take orders over the phone and the reporter customers tell me theyre here because they h home. One man is relaxing after a day doing his part to prevent other blackouts. Were grazing goats and sheep for prevention for wildfire and just came out to get some dinner and head back and check on the sheep some more. Reporter about a mile away, a single small generator powers some of the things jonathan really needs. But hed like his power back on too. The disposal isnt working. Oops, i threw stuff down the disposal. I cant get rid of it. The lights by and large dont work, and we dont have tv. Reporter pg e tells me about 172,000 customers were taken offline because of the psps. 22,000 of them in sonoma and napa counties. Tomorrow morning, power starts coming back on. By tomorrow night, everyone should have their electricity again. Live in santa rosa, Terry Mcsweeney, nbc bay area news. That will be such a east bay hills, brisk winds and low humidity are the recipe for a red flag warning, now extended into tomorrow. And forget about a morning hike. All regional parks are closed due to the hire fire danger. Nbc bay areas cheryl hurd is live in oakland where fire crews are on patrol, and these next 24 hours are critical. Reporter thats right. Crews here are keeping a close watch on the Berkeley Oakland hills. Bulldozers and fire tankers are strategically placed just in case a fire breaks out. The oakland crew onboard engine 24 making their rounds tonight in the east bay hills. We put an additional two Engine Companies out staffed at this fire station here, patrolling and then at fire station 24 as well. Reporter theyre concerned about dry vegetation, low humidity, and strong gusts of wind expected overnight. People who live in the hills are also bothered by the smoky conditions. All this is nature here. We get when its dry and when theres been no rain for a while. It is very concerning. Reporter Fire Departments all around the east bay say they have to be ready because fire season started way earlier than expected. At this time last year, the state had just under 5,000 fires, which burned 118,000 acres. Fast forward to this year. Firefighters have battled 7,600 fires, destroying 2. 3 million acres so far. Were stretched pretty thin but realizing that fire season for us is always september, october, the very hot, dry months. Right now youre looking at 9 , 10 relative humidity, which is how dry everything is. Reporter which is why crews are keeping a close watch on the east bay hills, keeping their equipment close by, and ready to roll. The red flag warning is expected to end 8 00 tomorrow morning. Reporting live in oakland, im cheryl hurd, nbc bay area news. Cheryl, thank you. We have new video this evening near chico in the plumas National Forest. This timelapse video shows just how quickly those flames exploded. This is part of the north complex fire. Flames are forcing evacuations in plumas, yuba, and butte counties. The concern with this fire is that its headed toward oroville. So far about 40,000 acres have burned. Take a look at these photos. The photographer was in willetts in mendocino county. It is nightmarish. This is not incident or even the evening. These photos were taken at 3 00 in the afternoon. The fire has burned 900 acres. Its in mendocino county. Its 10 contained. Here in the bay area, crews continue to make progress on the fire lines. The lnu complex fire in the north bay 91 contained. The scu complex fi, along the coast stands at 82 containment. As far as the woodward fire goes burning at point reyes, its at 95 containment. Along the central coast, more than a dozen firefighters, though, were overrun by flames. The crews were trying to protect their station in the rugged mountains of southern monterey county. But the flames overtook the station, burning it to the ground. At least two firefighters were flown to hospitals in fresno. Take a look at this. Were following breaking news in southern oregon. This is new video near medford. It looks ominous there. This fire right along interstate 5 and moving closer to the city of medford, which has a population of about 82,000 people. This could turn into a major disaster here. Many parts of medford are now under evacuation orders. And this view from space, you can see all that smoke from all of our west coast fires. Large plumes from washington, oregon, and california blowing offshore. And another view of our hazy skies. Check out this satellite loop from sunrise to sunset. You can see that smoke blanketing our state. Llave deta wave ending, air quality tomorrow, and when there are signs of rain in california. Its all coming up in about eight minutes. Also ahead, put on hold. The reason a drugmaker has paused its Clinical Trials of a potential coronavirus vaccine. Also in the red, but thats a good thing. A green light in Santa Clara County. Lots of reopenings, but not everybody gets to celebrate. Well explain. We made usaa insurance for veterans like liz and mike. An army family who is always at the ready. So when they got a little surprise. Two . They didnt panic. They got a bigger car for their soontobebigger family. After shopping around for insurance, they called usaa who helped find the right coverage for them and even some muchneeded savings. That was the easy part. Usaa insurance is made the way liz and mike need it easy. If i could, baby id how can i, when youe thewont take it from me it you can go your own way go your own way your wireless. Your rules. Only with xfinity mobile. Tonight, a lot of south bay businesses are breathing a sigh of relief and actually scrambling to reopen. Santa clara county has moved to the next tier on the states new covid monitoring list. You see all the color codes there. Its now at the red level along with San Francisco and napa counties. So what does this all mean . Well, in a nutshell, nail salons and body waxing salons can now reopen. So can tattoo parlors. Gyms can reopen at 10 capacity. Museums, zoos and aquariums at 25 capacity. All of this is indoors. This is great news for thousands of businesses in Santa Clara County that are struggling to survive. This was blossom nail spa, already with the Safety Measures in place. Theyre going to sanitize their partitioned booths after every customer and at the end of the day. Theyll check temperatures and follow social distancing guidelines. Im just ecstatic right now. I just dont know what to feel. Its like six months. Youve been waiting for this day, and finally its here. Im just so happy. They can open bright and early tomorrow morning, but not everyone is happy. The county is not allowing restaurants to resume any Indoor Dining even though the state says it can. And its not letting movie theaters open either, saying both activities are still too risky. Theres no indication when that might change. One more note. If the county remains red for two more weeks, schools could also bring students back into the classroom. The county says that will be a district by district decision. Santa cruz county also moved into the red tier today. That means nail and massage salons can open, restaurants, movie theaters, gyms, and places of worship can all open indoors with some modifications. The county has emphasized it is preparing for another covid surge since a lot of people who evacuated during the czu fire were forced into close quarters with other people. They warn if that happens, Santa Cruz County will move b to the purple tier and that new indoor businesses will have to shut down again. Back to school, back to class. More than a dozen schools in marin county got the green light to reopen today for inperson learning. All childrens academics in san rafael welcomed back students this morning but outside. The day began with a Temperature Check and washing of hands. Dozens of schools across the bay area also reopened including some in san mateo, santa clara, and contra costa counties. Are we ever going to get a break here . Seems like every week we have a new hurdle or some sort of disaster. No more high heat but we do have smoke and ash in every corner of our region. About three weeks weve been going through this. People are fed up. Heres nbc bay areas jean elle. Reporter a smoky sigh in San Francisco dims the sun. Along with the smoke is ash. I keep telling him that we need to close the windows at night because its literally just blowing into our apartment, and its very visible on surfaces. There was very visible ash on the sheets. Reporter Manuel Torres was rinsing ash off his car tonight. He took these pictures this morning in piz mow beach. He says the air was smoky all the way back to San Francisco. I mean its just sad. You know, you see the ash, and you think of like the slight discomfort that you have and you think about everybody else is going through really, really bad stuff. Reporter the ash coating surfaces in the Marina District didnt keep people inside, but medical experts say anyone with respiratory issues should close the windows and stay in if possible. They can trigger a fullblown attack of certain underlying respiratory conditions such as asthma or emphysema. Reporter some people found relief at a very foggy ocean beach. It feels healthy. I cant smell smoke, and my lungs arent hurting so. Reporter the bay area air Quality Management district says it expects this unhealthy air to continue in the region. It has extended the spare the air alert through wednesday, which is a record 23rd day in a row. In San Francisco, jean elle, nbc bay area news. All right. Lets bring in chief meteorologist jeff ranieri. I mean you can obviously relate to everybody. Like enough is enough already. We just need a break at this point. It is so frustrating, so depressing. You go outside, and its just everywhere. Ptsd for a lot of folk whos have had to evacuate. Then we just keep getting this smoke, this onslaught of it. And currently we are still under this red flag fire warning until 8 00 a. M. Tomorrow morning. A current check of the wind gusts right now, and the top wind gust in healdsburg is 59 miles per hour. Again, this is right now at this hour. Mount st. Helena at 47 miles per hour. Mount diablo, 38. Theres a big disparity between the Higher Elevations and lower elevations. Down in santa rosa, only 6 miles per hour, and calistoga at 5. The red flag fire warning may be allowed to expire a little bit earlier as we expect the wind to move out of here by tomorrow morning. Nonetheless, we are still looking at dicey conditions at the highest levels in the overnight hours. Lets take a look at the fires. Outside of the immediate bay area, three large fires that just have erupted over the past 72 hours. You have the august complex to the north, creek fire off towards the east south, the dolan fire. Contribu smoke across the bay area. But the interesting thing that i know a lot of you have noticed, and this next graphic helps explain it. Weve seen the smoke. We saw the haze. But the air quality wasnt necessarily very unhealthy for us today. You could smell a little bit of it, but it really didnt smell as bad as it looked. Theres a main reason why. When we get these large fires that i just showed you, it sends these smoke plumes well up into the atmosphere. It can range anywhere from 2,000 to 25,000 feet high depending on the fire. Once it gets into the upper atmosphere, that smoke can then travel hundreds of miles. We had a lot of smoke from the different fires traveling to the bay area, but some of the most harmful smoke particles stayed high up, so we didnt get that suffocating smoke smell. But when you looked off towards the distance, you saw the gray sky. Its all due to those pyrocumulus clouds. Thats why tomorrow well see the haze and smoke off towards the distants. Well be at unhealthy in the north bay and the beasteast bay. My forecast as we move through tomorrow morning starts us off cool. A change here for us. Low 60s for the south bay to the trivalley. Down to the 50s for San Francisco with some fog. And the north bay at 59. Afternoon temperatures, our heat wave has started to break. Down to 92 in concord. 89 san jose. 86 in palo alto. My extended forecast in San Francisco, 60s are back friday, saturday, and sunday. And for the inland valleys also dropping it way down friday, saturday, and sunday. We are back in the 80s. One thing real fast. Youll be happy about. My rain outlook into next week, maybe by tuesday, wednesday, and thursday, could bring the most northern part of california maybe a half inch or more of rainfall. So some good news on that respect. We still need to wait until we get closer to that, but any kind of rain we can get in this state right now is going to be amazing. So maybe some rain next week north of us, but still help out. Fingers crossed. That will be great. Thank you, jeff. Up next here at 11 00, not so fast. The safety issue that prompted a major drug maker to pause its testing of a promising covid19 vaccine. Apple will unveil its next set of new gadgets next tuesday. That includes a new i pipad and apple watch. They were expected to introduce an iphone 12 but that reveal will come sometimes later. Were back with more news. Motorcycle riders love the open road. And geico loves helping riders get to where theyre going, so to help even more, geico is giving new and current customers a fifteen percent credit on their motorcycle policies with the geico giveback. And because were committed for the long haul, the credit lasts your full policy term. The geico giveback. Helping riders focus on the road ahead. Of the potential vaccines for covid19. Astrazeneca has paused its Covid Vaccine trial after one person experienced serious side effects linked to that shot. The company says an independent committee will review safety data, adding that the pause in the trial is routine but required. So a pause in the Astrazeneca Oxford vaccine study doesnt really alarm me until i learn more about the details of why the study is paused. Its not unusual in Clinical Trials to have a serious adverse event. Dr. Peter chinhong says trials are also on hold at ucsf. In addition to astrazeneca, pfizer and moderna are in the late stage testing for their potential vaccines. Stiff punishment may be on the way for those who took part in that burning man beach party in San Francisco over the weekend. Supervisor Katherine Steph any is urging the d. A. And City Attorney to press charges against the events promoters. With the famed burning man festival in nevada canceled, more than 1,000 people showed up at ocean beach on saturday to celebrate. The gathering appears to have violated multiple city covid rules. All right. Something going on with the giants. Right now they are a playoff team. Well show you that magical comeback tonight at the ballpark. Stay with us. It was just a get together with friends. No big deal. Everybody felt fine. But now im super sick. Everyone is sick. I just wish we had been more careful. It would have been easier than this. So wear a mask. Do what you can outside. Stay six feet apart. Because some things you just cant take back. Do your part to lower the risk. Okay. Get ready. Baseball playoffs begin in three weeks and right now the giants are in. Theyre in right now . In. We should start the playoffs tomorrow. Theyve won seven of their last nine games. Giants and mariners, theyre staying loose. These are kaplers kids. They came back from a 51 deficit. Game tied in the seventh inning. Not anymore. Darin ruf with the pinchhit home run. The giants are now one game over. 500. Thats good enough for the eighth and final playoff spot in the national league. Giants beat the mariners 65. The as looking to sweep their doubleheader against the astros. It looked good. Third inning, the as jumping out to a 40 lead. A threerun homer for matt olson but the as gave it all back. The astros scored the final five runs of the night and were able to split the doubleheader. The first place as still hold a 4 1 2 game lead over the astros in the division. Colin kaepernick is back on the football field, at least virtually. For the first time in four years, kaepernick has returned to madden nfl. Hes the highest rated free agent. They can play him as the starting quarterback for any nfl team. Ea sports says it worked with the former 49ers quarterback to figure out how he would be depicted in the game. The company said the team at ea sports along with millions of madden fans want to see kap back in the game. Also the nfl Season Opener is only two days away. The super bowl champs, chiefs and texans right here on nbc bay area. We are back in a moment with more on that dangerous fire. Hi. Were glad you came in. Whats on your mind . Can you help keep these guys protected online . Easy. Connect to the xfi gateway. What about wireless data options for the family . You can customize and save. What about internet speeds that can keep up with my gaming . Lets hook you up with the Fastest Internet from xfinity. And now with our stores reopening, were putting Healthy Practices in place. Come visit a store today. Stop in or book an appointment online at a time that works for you. Now thats simple, easy, awesome. Ask. Shop. Discover at your local xfinity store today. An army family who is always at the ready. So when they got a little surprise. Two . They didnt panic. They got a bigger car for their soontobebigger family. After shopping around for insurance, they called usaa who helped find the right coverage for them and even some muchneeded savings. That was the easy part. Usaa insurance is made the way liz and mike need it easy. Its happening all around us. Jeff ranieri going to give us one final check of the fires. Were talking medford, oregon, the chico area, fresno. The list goes on, jeff. Yeah. Theres just so many fieres burning in every direction that our air quality as we move through tomorrow, at least for the next 12 hours, is going to be fluctuating into the unhealthy and also the moderate range. Best chance of the unhealthy would be the north bay and also the east bay. Again, this is going to be updated every 6 to 12 hours based on that forecast. The heat wave is over. 80s returning friday, saturday, and sunday. The good news on the forecast into next week, not really big rain chances for us at all, but near eureka, maybe threequarters of an inch, a little bit more possible. Any rain we can get in this state right now would definitely help us out. So that is a forecast to keep an eye on. Well have more tomorrow. Thank you, jeff. We need the help. Thanks for joining us here at 11 00. Hope to see you back here tomorrow. Bye