California fires worst in US state’s history as toll hits 42
More than a dozen coroner search and recovery teams looked for human remains from a Northern California wildfire that killed at least 42 - making it the deadliest in state history - as anxious relatives visited shelters and called police hoping to find loved ones alive.
Lisa Jordan drove 1,000 kilometres from Yakima, Washington, to search for her uncle, Nick Clark, and his wife, Anne Clark, of Paradise, California. Anne Clark suffers from multiple sclerosis and is unable to walk. No one knows if they were able to evacuate, or even if their house still exists, she said.
“I’m staying hopeful,” she said. “Until the final word comes, you keep fighting against it.”
Butte County Sheriff Kory Honea updated the confirmed fatality number Monday night - a figure that is almost certain to spike following the blaze that last week destroyed Paradise, a town of 27,000 about 290 kilometre) northeast of San Francisco.
Authorities were bringing in
PARADISE, USA:
two mobile morgue units and requesting 150 search and rescue personnel.
Officials were unsure of the exact number of missing.
“I want to recover as many remains as we possibly can, as soon as we can. Because I know the toll it takes on loved ones,” Honea said.
Chaplains accompanied some coroner search teams that visited dozens of addresses belonging to people reported missing. For those on the grim search, no cars in the driveway is good, one car a little more ominous and multiple burned-out vehicles equals a call for extra vigilance.
State officials said the cause of the inferno was under investigation.
Meanwhile, a landowner near where the blaze began, Betsy Ann Cowley, said she got an email from Pacific Gas & Electric Co. the day before the fire last week telling her that crews needed to come onto her property because the utility’s power lines were causing sparks. PG&E had no comment on the email.