The National Park Service has released information regarding last weekends Powerhouse fire, just west of where 140 and the Big Oak Flat Road meet, that was evidently an illegal campfire that got out of control.
NPS: “Just after midnight on the morning of Saturday, September 16th, a ranger contacted a man who was walking up the El Portal road, wearing a backpack and carrying a plastic bag of beer on ice in his hand. The man, who had not yet started to drink the beer, said that he was walking to Yosemite Valley. The ranger warned him that camping was only allowed in designated campgrounds and the man continued up the road. At about 5 a.m., park dispatch received a report of a wildland fire along the El Portal road. It quickly grew to three-and-a-half acres and was aggressively attacked by NPS, Forest Service and California Division of Forestry firefighters. A special agent was called in to investigate the fire, and dispatch broadcast a lookout for the man that the ranger had contacted along the road. About 45 minutes after the lookout went out, another ranger found the man, identified as 42-year-old William Rawlinson, walking along a road in Yosemite Valley. He had second-degree burns on his face and hands and immediately admitted to starting the fire. Rawlinson said that he had gone up into the woods and camped about a half mile from the point where the ranger had talked to him. He built a small fire, which escaped when he fell asleep. He said that the explosion of one of his beer cans woke him up and that fire was by then all around him. He got burned while trying to extinguish the fire with his sleeping bag. He was arrested and remains detained for a felony violation of 18 USC 1855 (setting timber afire) and for 36 CFR violations (illegal camping and lighting an illegal fire). Recovery of the cost of the suppression of the fire will be sought.”