All evacuation orders have been canceled and no road closures were in place.
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The largest active fire at this time, the Rocky Fire, is burning in a rural area north of Sacramento and the vineyards of Napa Valley. But late that day, flames roared across a two-lane highway that fire managers were counting on to help block its advance.
Thousands of firefighters battled yesterday to contain wildfires in California that have forced the evacuation of thousands of homes and burned more than 121,000 acres of land.
Throughout California’s forests, vegetation is so dry and so dense that flying embers, which in wetter years would fizzle out, are igniting at the mere touch of grass or shrub.
Many firefighters have gear packed and ready to go. “They just know they need people in California right now”.
California fire crews are continuing to battle the Rocky Fire after it jumped a highway in Lake County, eliminating a natural break that would have helped tame the 62,000-acre fire that has spread over a swath of land in three counties.
President Barack Obama is asking his aides to stay in close touch with California’s governor and other local officials as firefighters tackle an unruly wildfire. The fire was just 12 percent contained as of 8:00 a.m. Monday morning. Currently, 6,301 structures are threatened.
At least 24 homes were destroyed as the blaze was whipped up by winds that fuelled the flames, our correspondent says.
He said the fire ripped through the forests at break-neck speed, with firefighters struggling to keep apace.
“Tinder dry conditions from the drought continue to allow wildfires to burn at an explosive rate”, said the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, or CAL FIRE.
The rugged terrain where wildfires occur makes the firefighting mission even more challenging, said Maj. The oaks, conifers and brush in the region haven’t burned before, making conditions more volatile and recovery of the landscape more uncertain.
In an update Monday night, CALFIRE said the threat of new fires being ignited by lightning from passing thunderstorms remains high. And while efforts have been underway for months to manually thin the forests, Collins says it hasn’t been almost enough. It chewed through 20,000 acres in about five hours, he said.
“We had a little bit of growth yesterday”, after a small line of trees caught fire, said Richard Hadley, a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service spokesman working with the U.S. Forest Service on the Cabin Fire.
The crews arrived in Redding Sunday, and were deployed to nearby Shasta-Trinity National Forest, according to South Carolina Forestry Commission. “In fact several of the fires are near containment or nearly completely contained”, he said on CNN.
Firefighters from the Long Beach Fire Department monitor flames from the Rocky fire near Clearlake, Calif., on Monday, August 3, 2015.
“Worst part is I can’t get in to see what’s been damaged or no”, she said.
Other fires include the Frog Fire, which has burned about 4,200 acres since Thursday.
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Rocky countered early gains by fire crews with a couple of vicious jabs on Monday afternoon.
