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Fourteen of them are routinely available to fight brush fires, while the other four are assigned to ambulances, although they might help with evacuations or rescues during fires.

Without strategically placed reinforcements, the handful of engines had virtually no prospects of carrying out the LAFD’s strategy for brush fires — hit it hard and fast, the former fire officials said.

But with calamity averted, there was little debate on how to avoid future brush fires from tearing through L.A.’s foothill communities.

Residents similarly detained a man suspected of starting a brush fire Monday afternoon near the Chatsworth Reservoir.

A group of neighbors chased down a man suspected of starting two brush fires Monday afternoon near the Chatsworth Reservoir and held him until Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies arrived on the scene.