Mordor In The East Bay

The Mt. Diablo fire in San Francisco's East Bay has grown to 3700 acres.

A fire dubbed the "Morgan Fire" burning near Mount Diablo State Park in California quadrupled in size from Sunday night, charring a total of 3,700 acres by Monday afternoon and forcing evacuations of about 100 homes. That was more than double the number from early Monday morning, when the blaze had charred 1,500 acres, and four times the size of Sunday's peak – 800 acres – after the brush fire broke out just after 1 p.m. on the eastern side of Mount Diablo. "The fire has grown significantly," Cal Fire Division Chief Dave Shew told NBC Bay Area. He could not estimate when the fire might be contained. That, he said, might become more clear in the next day or two.

The blaze was only 20% contained as of this morning.

San Franciscans Trapped! Sort Of!

The Bay Bridge is closed for the next four days as workers connect a new segment as work continues on a portion of the bridge damaged in 1989's Loma Prieta earthquake.

During the closure, a 300-foot-long portion of the original East Span will be cut and moved out. A new double-deck section will be put in place. It will link the bridge with a new half-mile-long detour connecting the East Span with the Yerba Buena Island Tunnel. Traffic will be allowed on this detour until the new Bay Bridge opens. The Northern California bridge will reopen by 5 a.m. Tuesday, Sept. 8. The $5.7 billion Bay Bridge East Span replacement project is scheduled to be finished in 2013. The work is part of a project to bring the bridge up to current earthquake standards.

Finished in only 24 years? That's MTA speed!