Group of local firefighters return from Ridgecrest after massive quake

A team of nearly thirty local firefighters returned Monday from the shaken city of Ridgecrest.

Regional Task Force Five as it's called is made up of rescue trained firefighters from Fresno County and the cities of Fresno, Clovis, Tulare, and Merced.

The team got the call at around ten on Friday night, were on the road by midnight, and hit the ground running once in Ridgecrest.

"A lot of what we were doing was just being a public presence out there for the local firefighters who were immediately overwhelmed by the incident, supporting their efforts, and then just making sure that there wasn't anyone who fell through the cracks," said Brian Price with the Fresno Fire Department.

They also searched for cracks in the surrounding infrastructure.

Crews say they saw some mobile homes knocked off their foundations and a decent amount of damage from fires that came after the quakes.

Merced Fire Engineer Will Swan surveyed nearby Inyokern from a pickup truck.

"Just to see if there was any damage and talk to the locals. Anytime we saw anyone walking around you know, we'd kind of wave them down, ask them is everything ok? How's your house, checked on your neighbor's things like that," said Swan.

The local firefighters felt aftershocks as they worked, and knew there was the potential for an even bigger event.

Thankfully that didn't happen.

But locals were still grateful that Regional Task Force Five was there.

"People would get in their car, they'd drive around town until they could find firefighters and they would give us water, food, whatever they could do to try and help show their support," said Price.