![](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/1786279215_831_SJM-L-MALECHFIRE-01.jpg\")
<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\t\t\t\t\tMalech Fire in the Coyote Valley area of South San Jose, as seen from an aircraft on Aug. 8, 2026. (Cal FIRE)\n\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/1786279216_790_SJM-L-MALECHFIRE-02.jpg\")
A plane spreads fire retardant on a fire in the Coyote Valley area of South San Jose, as seen on Aug. 8, 2026 (Cal FIRE)\u00a0<\/p>\n
Firefighters responded on the ground and in the air to a 32-acre blaze on San Jose\u2019s southern edges near Coyote Valley on Saturday afternoon.<\/p>\n
The fire, east of Highway 101, was first reported around noon Saturday in the 9500 block of Malech Road, a grassy, rural area near Field Sports County Park. Between 12:30 p.m. and 1:17 p.m., the blaze spread from 10 acres to 32 acres as winds pushed it away from the freeway and toward the Mount Hamilton foothills overlooking Coyote Valley.<\/p>\n
Firefighters from Cal Fire and the San Jose Fire Department halted the fire\u2019s forward progress by 2 p.m., according to Cal Fire\u2019s SCU unit, and by late afternoon Saturday were working on mop-up \u2014 the process of dousing smoking areas with water and completely extinguishing remaining embers and other hot spots.<\/p>\n
\u201cI would consider it a fairly routine grassfire,\u201d said Megan Robinson, a supervising open space technician with the Santa Clara Valley Open Space Authority, a government agency based in San Jose. \u201cThe firefighters were on it fast. They went at it pretty hard so it didn\u2019t turn into anything worse.\u201d<\/p>\n
There were no reports of any injuries or structures damaged.<\/p>\n
Much of the land where the fire burned is located on the Coyote Ridge Open Space Preserve, owned by the Santa Clara Valley Open Space Authority. Until the agency purchased it in 2014<\/a>, the 1,859-acre property was owned by UTC \u2014 United Technologies Corporation \u2014 an early Silicon Valley aerospace company that built and tested rocket motors there that powered Tomahawk and Minuteman missiles for the military, as well as NASA spacecraft that explored Mars, Venus, Jupiter and the sun.<\/p>\n Since 2023 the property has been open to the public for hiking, biking, and horse riding.<\/p>\n The cause of Saturday\u2019s fire was under investigation.<\/p>\n The adjacent property, Field Sports County Park, is a shooting range for skeet, trap, rifle and pistol shooting. The only public shooting range in Santa Clara County, it was evacuated shortly after the fire began to send columns of black smoke up over the area.<\/p>\n \u201cIt is very popular on the weekend,\u201d said Nadine Abousalem, a spokeswoman for the Santa Clara County Parks and Recreation Department, which owns the site. \u201cThere were a few dozen people evacuated.\u201d<\/p>\n Abousalem said the range also will be closed Sunday as fire crews finish mop-up work. The open space preserve also will be closed Sunday, Robinson said.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s dry vegetation out there,\u201d Abousalem said. \u201cIt was a grass fire moving uphill toward the ridge. Luckily, no structures were damaged and nobody was hurt. There was a really quick response.\u201d<\/p>\n