These are forest fires caused by lightning and electrical storms; the worst to hit that state in two decades.
By:
Reuters / AP Photos
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Dozens of California wildfires sparked by lightning bolts grew rapidly on Thursday 20-A, forcing tens of thousands of people to evacuate their homes in the San Francisco Bay area, as resources for fighting the fires were at the bottom. limit.
California has been hit by its worst thunderstorms in nearly two decades, with about 11,000 discharges causing more than 370 fires this week, authorities said.
South of San Francisco, a cluster of lightning fires doubled in size to 16,000 hectares in San Mateo and Santa Cruz counties, injuring three first responders, forcing 22,000 people to evacuate and destroying 20 buildings, according to the authority of CalFire fires.
Big Basin Redwoods State Park, the oldest in California with some of its oldest redwoods, suffered extensive damage from the CZU Lightning Complex fire, the state parks department said.
As the fire moved south, the University of California Santa Cruz called for voluntary evacuations of its campuses on the north side of the coastal city.
To the north, at least nine fires spread through the hills of California’s wine country, about 35 miles southwest of Sacramento, destroying more than 105 homes and other structures.
The LNU Fire Complex has doubled in size to 53,000 hectares since Wednesday, forming a “mega fire” 10 times the size of New York’s Manhattan Island through Napa, Yolo, Solano and two other counties.
A PG&E worker died Wednesday 19-A helping first responders, the second fatality from the fires after the death of a fire helicopter pilot in an accident.
Another group of 20 fires, called the SCU Lightning Complex, expanded by nearly a third to about 56,000 acres Thursday, 20 miles from Palo Alto.
“The fire is moving faster than we can safely attack it,” California Fire Captain Stephen Volmer said in video.
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