Thousands of people in California are under evacuation control as dozens of wildfires devastated parts of the state on Wednesday with an unrelenting heat wave and high winds that made arson difficult.
Governor Gavin Newsom has declared a state of emergency during evacuations and rolling blackouts and called on the California National Guard to help with relief efforts. Authorities in Sonoma County warned of an “immediate threat to life” from the ongoing fires.
By Wednesday morning, residents in parts of Northern California, including Napa and Sonoma Counties, San Mateo and Santa Cruz, were on urgent evacuation. The LNU Lightning Complex Fire burned 32,000 acres in Sonoma, Lake, Napa and Solano Counties and destroyed some homes.
The more than two dozen fires raging across the state are being made less by an extreme heat wave that began over the weekend. It recently set a temperature of 130 degrees Fahrenheit in the Death Valley of California, the warmest American temperature in at least 107 years.
The extreme heat and drought are driven by a heat dome, like a high pressure system that pushes air from top to bottom, which then compresses and heats near land. Heat domes are likely to be heavier as the climate changes.
Climate change is driving faster and more frequent hot waves around the world, causing increasingly severe wildfires. In the U.S., California experienced the worst of the devastation, including the Thomas Fire in 2017 and Camp Fire in 2018 that collectively killed more than 100 people and left tens of thousands of people homeless.
Extreme lightning storms have helped ignite some of the fires, with at least 6,000 lightning strikes recorded since Tuesday that left more than 200 fires in the state, according to the California Department of State Forest Management and Fire Protection.
In this long exposure photo, flames consumed both sides of a segment of Lake Berryessa during the Hennessey fire in the Spanish Flat Area of Napa, California on August 18, 2020.
Josh Edelson | AFP | Getty Images
“California and its federal and local partners are working in lockstep to meet the challenge and remain vigilant in the face of continuing dangerous weather conditions,” Newsom said on Tuesday.
The fires, which release an enormous amount of smoke into the air, come before the state with a rise in coronavirus cases, creating fears for the safety of firefighters and those who evacuate their homes.
The pandemic has punished emergency sources and hindered preparation for the fire season in recent months.
People stand next to flames rising from the ranch fire in the San Gabriel Mountains above Azusa, 25 miles east of Los Angeles, California, on August 14, 2020.
Apu Gomes | AFP | Getty Images
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