YREKA, Calif. (AP) – At least two people have died in a wildfire in California that was among thousands of homes threatening the western U.S. Monday
Two bodies were found Sunday inside a charred vehicle in the driveway of a home near the remote Klamath River community, the Siskiyou County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement. The names of the victims and other details were not immediately released.
The McKinney wildfire in northern California, near the state line with Oregon, has exploded in size to nearly 225 square kilometers after it broke out in the Klamath National Forest on Friday, fire officials said. It’s California’s largest wildfire of the year so far, and officials have yet to determine the cause.
Wind gusts from an electrical storm pushed the blaze of several hundred hectares into a massive conflagration while lightning sparked a couple of smaller fires nearby, including one near the community of Seiad Valley, fire officials said.
On Monday, heavy rain helped dampen the blaze, but it still threatened structures after burning more than 100, ranging from homes to greenhouses, fire and sheriff’s officials said.
About 2,500 people remained under evacuation orders.
“If you get an order, it means you’re going. This fire behavior, as you’re going to hear, is unbelievable. Don’t try to fight it. Don’t try to stay,” said County Office of Emergency Services Director of Siskiyou, Bryan Schenone, at a community meeting Monday evening.
Stormy, cloudy weather helped firefighters attack the blaze, and bulldozers had managed to touch down in the town of Yreka, fire officials said.
As of Monday, the fire was about 4 miles (6.4 kilometers) from the town of about 7,500 people.
Valerie Linfoot’s son, a firefighter, called to say his family’s home of three decades on the Klamath River had burned down. Linfoot said her husband worked as a firefighter for the U.S. Forest Service for years, and the family did everything they could to prepare their home for a wildfire, including installing a metal roof lic and the cutting of trees and tall grass around the property.
“It was as safe as we could make it, and it was so dry and so hot and the fire was going so fast,” Linfoot told the Bay Area News Group. He said his neighbors have also lost their homes.
“It’s a beautiful place. And from what I’ve seen, it’s just decimated. It’s absolutely destroyed,” he told the newsgroup.
In northwestern Montana, winds picked up Monday afternoon on a wildfire burning in forested land west of Flathead Lake, forcing fire managers to ground all aircraft and led the Lake County Sheriff’s Office to begin evacuating residents in the northeast corner of the fire.
The fire was producing a lot of smoke, creating visibility problems for aircraft, said Sara Rouse, a spokeswoman for the fire management team.
The fire, which started Friday afternoon near the town of Elmo on the Flathead Indian Reservation, measured 20 square miles (52 square kilometers), fire officials said.
The Moose Fire in Idaho has burned more than 85 square miles (220 square kilometers) in the Salmon-Challis National Forest while threatening homes, mining operations and fisheries near the town of Salmon. It was 23% contained on Monday.
And a wildfire that broke out in northwestern Nebraska prompted evacuations and destroyed or damaged several homes near the small town of Gering. The Carter Canyon Fire started Saturday as two separate fires that merged. It was contained around 30% early Monday.
In California, Gov. Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency on Saturday, allowing him more flexibility to make emergency response decisions and recovery efforts and tap into federal aid.
Scientists have said climate change has made the West warmer and drier over the past three decades and will continue to make weather more extreme and wildfires more frequent and destructive.
The US Forest Service closed a 177-kilometer (110-mile) section of the famed Pacific Crest Trail in northern California and southern Oregon. Sixty hikers in that area were helped to evacuate Saturday, according to the Jackson County Sheriff’s Office in Oregon, which assisted in the effort.
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Weber reported from Los Angeles. Associated Press reporter Amy Hanson in Helena, Montana; Margery Beck in Omaha, Nebraska; and Keith Ridler in Boise, Idaho, contributed to this report.