A vegetation fire in a remote part of Orange County was burning unreported and unnoticed last month until officials were pinged by artificial intelligence, according to authorities.
The Orange County Fire Authority detailed the event in a post to X on Friday.
At about 2 a.m. on Dec. 4, the University of California San Diego’s ALERTCalifornia camera network’s AI alerted the OCFA of an anomaly spotted on video footage. The network has several cameras located across high-risk areas in Southern California.
The anomaly turned out to be a vegetation fire in Black Star Canyon, east of Irvine Lake. After being alerted by AI, fire crews were able to contain the blaze to less than a quarter of an acre and keep homes and people safe.
The remote location, combined with the darkness in the area and how early in the morning that the blaze occurred, meant that without AI detection, the fire could’ve grown significantly before being noticed by any human.