Authorities said Tuesday that a memorial service is planned for Sunday in Wenatchee, Washington, for firefighters Tom Zbyszewski, 20, Richard Wheeler, 31, and Andrew Zajac, 26.
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That combined damage makes 2015 “certainly the most severe in terms of timing of multiple large fires simultaneously”, Jaime Smith, a spokeswoman for state Governor Jay Inslee, told AFP on Monday.
The sun turns red as it sets through smoke from the Washington fires.
“It’s been a nightmare to breathe”, Okanogan County Sheriff Frank Rogers said. Don’t choose a one-strap paper dust mask or a surgical mask that hooks around your ears – these don’t protect you against the fine particles in smoke. It’s only the sixth-worst going back to 1960, but it’s the biggest area burned by this date in a decade, so the ranking is sure to rise.
A group of wildfires blazing in the western US state of Washington have become the largest in the state s history, officials said Monday.
About 70 firefighters from Australia and New Zealand have arrived in Boise, Idaho, and are scheduled to receive protective gear Monday before heading out to fight fires burning in the West.
Jim Whittington, a Bureau of Land Management spokesman in Portland, said military assets can not be used against wildfires until all civilian resources are deployed.
The Okanogan fires, which have claimed the lives of three firefighters, grew by 2.6 square miles on Monday night and have now burned 403 square miles.
173-a-13-(Todd Pechota (puh-CHOH’-tuh), fire incident commander, at news conference)-“to contructing line”-Fire incident commander Todd Pechota says the crews continue to battle full-force at the Okanogan Complex Fire“. Thunderstorms were possible later in the week.
“Hot, dry and unstable conditions will create an environment conducive to increased growth on existing wildfires”, the Weather Service said in its warning.
A silver lining from the wildfires burning around BC as the thick smoke in parts of the province is actually calming some fire activity. They were able to build a perimeter halfway around the blaze, but hundreds of homes remained threatened in the mountainous area about 100 miles east of Los Angeles.
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With fires raging both on the reservation and off it – as well as upwind in Washington and Oregon – Julie Simpson, the coordinator for the Nez Perce Tribe Air Quality Program, said the levels were the worst her program had seen since testing began in 2001.
