Thousands flee as wildfires ravage California

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Thousands of people have been forced to flee their homes in California’s Napa Valley when wildfires fueled by fierce winds hit the world-famous wine country.

Under a dull orange sky and a new sweltering heat wave, vineyards were consumed and homes ravaged by the fire that broke out at a “dangerous rate of spread” over 11,000 acres, Cal Fire said.

Napa’s famous wineries have already vanished, such as Chateau Boswell and part of Castello di Amorosa, while other vineyards such as Merus Wines and Davis Estates were under imminent threat from fast-moving flames, according to local reports.

“We saved the winery last night, but everything else was lost,” Tuck Beckstoffer, president of a 20-acre vineyard near St. Helena, told Wine Spectator magazine.

Calistoga, a quaint upper Napa Valley community known for its hot springs and as a launch pad for wine tours, has been largely evacuated.

Hell threatens communities in Napa and neighboring Sonoma that are still reeling from the devastating wildfires of 2017, when 44 people were killed and thousands of buildings were razed.

Earlier today, strong winds with gusts of up to 55 mph blew embers and spread flames, including Glass Fire and Shady Fire, which have merged as more than 1,000 firefighters fight to control the flames.

The remains of a house that was destroyed in Santa Rosa, California

Homes on the edges of Sonoma County’s most populous city, Santa Rosa, home to 177,000 residents, had started to burn, while Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) cut power to 65,000 homes in Northern California as a measure. precautionary.

Firefighters were deploying 133 engines, 22 water tenders, five helicopters and 35 excavators, the Napa Valley Register said.

Susie Fielder fled her home in St. Helena at 3:30 a.m., taking a picture of her grandparents off the wall and a small pre-stocked bag of essentials after a warning alarm went off in her neighborhood.

“This morning I was thinking what would you do if you lose everything?” Fielder told AFP.

Upon returning from a shelter in the city of Napa shortly before noon, his home was covered in ash and without power, but unharmed.

Nearby Spring Mountain, ravaged by flames, was barely visible through the smoke as Fielder went to work cleaning and moving perishable food into a generator-powered freezer.

You don’t plan to unpack your essential “travel bag” until at least November, whenever the rain comes.

“I’ll stay until someone comes, knocks on my door and tells me I have to go,” Fielder said.

California has been battling massive wildfires for months, fueled by dry conditions, strong seasonal winds and high temperatures that the state’s leadership has attributed to climate change.

Parts of the state have been engulfed at times in thick smoke, while evacuations have been complicated by the coronavirus that has hit California hard.

Five of the six most destructive wildfires in California history have started since last month and are still burning, according to state fire agency Cal Fire.

Strong winds and temperatures that rose over the weekend have intensified them, including the massive North Complex fire in northeastern California, where new evacuations were ordered yesterday near the small town of Paradise.

Paradise was devastated by the deadliest fire in the state’s modern history, the Camp Fire, which in November 2018 killed 86 people and destroyed about 18,000 buildings.

Kale Casey, a fire spokesman for the historic 880,000-acre August Complex fire, said light winds had already “blown away” the flames from contained areas prior to the dramatic events of the past 24 hours.

“And then you have a day like yesterday where all hell breaks loose,” he said at a virtual press conference.



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