Residents in Lower Lake and surrounding communities are still recovering from California’s third-most-destructive wildfire a year ago, which burned 120 square miles and cost more than $1.5 billion in damages. In fact it burned into Lower Lake so quickly that it was all our firefighters could do was just to get resident out of harm’s way as the fire continued to race here as embers rained down on the homes.
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More than 175 homes and businesses have been destroyed since the fire broke out around 5:00 pm on Saturday (0000 GMT Sunday).
California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection spokesman Daniel Berlant said Monday that the fire in Lower Lake, about 90 miles north of San Francisco, has scorched almost 5 square miles.
About 4,000 people have fled their homes as a growing wildfire in Northern California burns into a town and destroys at least 10 homes.
“Our goal is to just hold it back”, said Daniel Berlant, a spokesman for CAL FIRE.
The family is safe, as are their 16 goats and several chickens.
In Southern California, forecasters warned of high fire danger due to a heat wave and gusty winds.
Pimlott added the fire has caused more than $10 million in damages and has left dozens homeless.
The area already suffered huge blazes past year when the Valley, Jerusalem and Rocky Fires broke out, taking several lives and destroying thousands of homes.
Underlying it all is a five-year drought that has sapped vegetation of moisture.
Lake County sheriffs deputies were investigating burned-out structures. Lawns in front of Lower Lake’s modest, one-story homes are brown, matching the wildland grasses on the mountains outside town.
The blaze in San Luis Obispo County, about 180 miles northwest of Los Angeles, has destroyed 12 structures and injured two people.
In wetter times, the region was not visited by the kind of wildfires that it’s seen over the past year.
Residents have a new view of the wild beauty they’ve always admired.
Officers took 40-year-old Damin Anthony Pashilk into custody and charged him with 17 counts of arson in Northern California. “The trees are lovely, but when they catch fire, they carry fire”.
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The conflagration is one of two dozen major wildfires across the drought-parched U.S. West that have all together charred almost 300,000 acres (120,000 hectares).
