Kate Bradshaw

Nearby wineries are unscathed so far, but remain on edge.

By Kate Bradshaw and Rick Hurd

This story was first published in The Mercury News on June 17, 2024.

Wine lovers were watching anxiously Monday as firefighters engaged with a stubborn early-season blaze threatening some of Sonoma’s most famed vineyards.

The Point Fire, which had razed some 1,190 acres and was 20 percent contained as of 4 p.m. Monday, was burning close to the Dry Creek Valley AVA, a 16-mile swath that’s home to about 60 wineries and 9,000 acres of vineyards. The blaze broke out around 12:30 p.m. Sunday about 12 miles northwest of Healdsburg.

As of midafternoon Monday, some of the vines at Healdsburg’s Bella Vineyards and Wine Caves likely had been burned or singed — the fire’s full impact was not yet clear — but overall, the wildfire damage should be minimal, according to Lauren Fremont, executive director of Winegrowers of Dry Creek Valley. And because it’s so early in the wine-growing season and the grapes are still so small, she said that they might be unaffected by smoke taint, which doomed vintages for some wineries during the 2020 Glass Fire.

“It was a mix of a lot of work and a lot of luck with the wind shifting,” Fremont said. “We got very lucky this time.”

Full story here.