Where is the Bear Fire burning? Here’s what we know about the small Sierra towns there

The Bear Fire in Sierra County grew to 3,000 acres as of Wednesday morning amid hot summer conditions and difficult terrain to navigate.

The fire was first reported at 2 p.m. Monday near Bear Valley Road in the Tahoe National Forest south of Sierra Brooks in Sierra County. As of Wednesday, it was within 1 mile of Sierra Brooks and 3 miles of Loyalton. The area is 40 miles north of Truckee and the northern shore of Lake Tahoe and 100 miles northeast of Sacramento.

Sierra Brooks is a town with a population of about 500 people, according to Census data. It’s a few miles west of the Nevada border just south of Loyalton, Sierra County’s only incorporated city. The city has a population of about 700 people and is known for being settled in the 1850s by Italian and Swiss immigrants who stayed in the valley to supply gold miners with dairy products.

Officials said the rough terrain has hindered firefighters’ access to various points of the fire. Planes are being used to drop fire retardant and water. In a morning briefing Wednesday, officials said Interagency Management Team 2 — a group of federal firefighters called in for complex incidents — has been assigned to the blaze, and would join crews from the Tahoe National Forest and Cal Fire’s Nevada-Yuba-Placer unit Wednesday evening.

As of Tuesday, 286 structures and 536 residents in the area were under evacuation orders while 760 residents were without power due to high-voltage electrical lines being within the fire’s perimeter.

The cause of the fire is unknown and being investigated.