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THOUSANDS OF EVACUATIONS: Large areas that are burning have led to thousands of people having to evacuate. Photo: Noah Berger / AP FR34727
Huge wildfires continue to ravage the states of California, Oregon, and Washington.
Large wildfires have ravaged California in recent weeks. Strong winds have now helped the fires to spread at record speed along the west coast of the United States. Nearly a hundred fires are now raging in the states of California, Oregon, and Washington.
Thousands of people have had to flee their homes. In Oregon, more than a thousand homes were destroyed by the fires. Local authorities fear lives will be lost.
“This could lead to the largest loss of life and property due to wildfires in our state’s history,” Oregon Gov. Kate Brown said at a news conference Wednesday, Reuters wrote.
EVACUATION: Catherine Shields in the process of evacuating the Takoda horse from her property in Silverton, Oregon on Wednesday. Photo: Andrew Selsky / AP
As of Wednesday, five states, with a total of more than 30 million residents, have “red” hazard levels: Washington, Oregon, California, in addition to Nevada and Arizona.
The fires have spread to several Oregon cities, where hundreds of homes have caught fire.
– In the past 24 hours, Oregon has experienced wildfires like we’ve never experienced before, with devastating consequences across the state. Our first priority now is saving lives, Governor Brown wrote on Twitter on Thursday evening Norwegian time.
In the city of Malden in Washington state, about 80 percent of buildings and infrastructure have been destroyed by fires, including the fire station, post office, city hall and library.
In just a few days, a larger area in the state has burned than firefighters typically see in an entire year, writes The Guardian.
FOREST FIRE: This is what it looked like Wednesday at Bidwell Bar Bridge in Oroville, Northern California. Photo: Noah Berger / AP FR34727
In California, wildfires are the largest in modern history, writes The New York Times. So far this year, there have been 2,650 more fires than at the same time last year. Eight people have lost their lives in the fires, which according to NTB have burned more than 890,000 hectares.
Read also: Fires burn in California
– What is special now is the number of fires. Even for someone who is working to understand what is happening, it is difficult to keep up, Chris Fields, who heads the Stanford Woods environmental institute, tells The Guardian.
