Firefighters yesterday battled raging blazes at both ends of drought-stricken California, with the death toll rising to at least 23 and strong winds and dry conditions in the forecast.
The largest fires were in Butte County, a scenic area in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada north of Sacramento, and in the Los Angeles area, where two deaths possibly related to a fire were reported.
Acrid smoke from the fire covered the sky for miles, the sun barely visible. On the ground, cars caught in the flames were reduced to metal carcasses, while power lines were gnawed by the flames.
Photo: AFP
Butte County Sheriff Kory Honea told a news conference on Saturday that 14 more bodies had been found, bringing the number of fatalities of a blaze known as the “Camp Fire” to 23.
Mandatory evacuation orders were issued for more than 52,000 people in the area.
In the town of Paradise, more than 6,700 buildings — including a hospital, a gas station and several restaurants — have been consumed by the fire.
Rescuers removed human remains over several hours in Paradise and placed them in a black hearse. Charred body parts were transported by bucket, while intact remains were carried in body bags.
The mobile homes at the Holly Hills Mobile Estate had been reduced to smoldering piles of debris. Yellow police tape marked spots that were tagged “Doe C” and “Doe D,” suggesting that bodies were found there.
Locals fled the danger, but police told reporters that some farmers returned to check on their cattle.
Fanned by strong winds, the blaze has so far scorched 40,500 hectares and was 20 percent contained, the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (Cal Fire) said.
So far, three of the more than 3,200 firefighters deployed have been injured.
They will need three weeks to fully contain the blaze, firefighters said.
Local power authorities told state officials that an outage occurred near the spot where the fire erupted, the Sacramento Bee reported, but there was no official cause of the Camp Fire blaze.
US President Donald Trump, in France for World War I commemorations, drew criticism for an unsympathetic reaction to the devastation.
“There is no reason for these massive, deadly and costly forest fires in California except that forest management is so poor,” Trump tweeted. “Billions of dollars are given each year, with so many lives lost, all because of gross mismanagement of the forests. Remedy now, or no more Fed payments!”
Brian Rice, the head of the California Professional Firefighters, slammed the tweet as “ill-informed, ill-timed and demeaning to those who are suffering, as well as the men and women on the front lines.”
He said the US president’s claim that forest policies were mismanaged “is dangerously wrong.”
Trump later showed more sympathy.
“Our hearts are with those fighting the fires,” as well as the evacuees and families of the victims, he tweeted. “God Bless them all.”
In southern California, more wildfires burned, including one just north of Los Angeles and another in Ventura County near Thousand Oaks.
Two bodies were found in Malibu — one of the most coveted locations in California and home to a bevy of Hollywood stars — in an area where the “Woolsey Fire” swept through, the Los Angeles County Sheriff Department said.
However the incident “is being investigated by the homicide department,” a department spokesperson told reporters.
The Woolsey Fire has consumed about 33,500 hectares, destroyed at least 177 structures and was 5 percent contained, Cal Fire said on Saturday.
Evacuation orders had been issued for about 88,000 homes in Ventura County and neighboring Los Angeles County.
The wildfire reached Paramount Ranch, destroying the Western Town sets used for hundreds of productions, including HBO’s sci-fi western Westworld, network officials said.
RISK REMAINS: An official said that with the US presidential elections so close, it is unclear if China would hold war games or keep its reaction to angry words The Ministry of National Defense said it was “on alert” as it detected a Chinese aircraft carrier group to Taiwan’s south yesterday amid concerns in Taiwan about the possibility of a new round of Chinese war games. The ministry said in a statement that a Chinese navy group led by the carrier Liaoning had entered waters near the Bashi Channel, which connects the South China Sea and the Pacific Ocean and separates Taiwan from the Philippines. It said the carrier group was expected to enter the Western Pacific. The military is keeping a close watch on developments and “exercising an
FIVE-YEAR WINDOW? A defense institute CEO said a timeline for a potential Chinese invasion was based on expected ‘tough measures’ when Xi Jinping seeks a new term Most Taiwanese are willing to defend the nation against a Chinese attack, but the majority believe Beijing is unlikely to invade within the next five years, a poll showed yesterday. The poll carried out last month was commissioned by the Institute for National Defense and Security Research, a Taipei-based think tank, and released ahead of Double Ten National Day today, when President William Lai (賴清德) is to deliver a speech. China maintains a near-daily military presence around Taiwan and has held three rounds of war games in the past two years. CIA Director William Burns last year said that Chinese President Xi Jinping
REACTION TO LAI: A former US official said William Lai took a step toward stability with his National Day speech and the question was how Beijing would respond US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday warned China against taking any “provocative” action on Taiwan after Beijing’s reaction to President William Lai’s (賴清德) speech on Double Ten National Day on Thursday. Blinken, speaking in Laos after an ASEAN East Asia Summit, called the speech by Lai, in which he vowed to “resist annexation,” a “regular exercise.” “China should not use it in any fashion as a pretext for provocative actions,” Blinken told reporters. “On the contrary, we want to reinforce — and many other countries want to reinforce — the imperative of preserving the status quo, and neither party taking any
President William Lai (賴清德) yesterday said that China has “no right to represent Taiwan,” but stressed that the nation was willing to work with Beijing on issues of mutual interest. “The Republic of China has already put down roots in Taiwan, Penghu, Kinmen and Matsu,” Lai said in his first Double Ten National Day address outside the Presidential Office Building in Taipei. “And the Republic of China and the People’s Republic of China [PRC] are not subordinate to each other.” “The People’s Republic of China has no right to represent Taiwan,” he said at the event marking the 113th National Day of
RSS