Death toll from Tennessee wildfire climbs to 10

LOS ANGELES: The death toll from a devastating blaze in and around the Great Smoky Mountains National Park in Tennessee rose to 10 on Thursday, marking the highest loss of civilian life from a single US wildfire in 13 years.

Investigators, meanwhile, have determined the so-called Chimney Tops 2 fire, which laid waste to whole neighborhoods earlier this week in the resort town of Gatlinburg, was caused by unspecified human activity, officials said.

Total property losses from the fire have been put at more than 700 structures, with most of the destruction in Gatlinburg, known as the “gateway to the Great Smoky Mountains” in eastern Tennessee, about 64 km southeast of Knoxville.

In a televised briefing for reporters on Thursday, Sevier County Mayor Larry Waters said the number of people confirmed killed in the fire was now 10, up from seven deaths reported on Wednesday.

That made Chimney Tops 2 the nation’s single deadliest wildfire since 2013, when 19 firefighters perished near Prescott, Arizona.

It also ranks as the largest civilian death toll from a US wildfire since 15 people, including a firefighter, were killed in Southern California’s Cedar Fire in 2003, according to Jessica Gardetto, a spokeswoman for the National Interagency Fire Center in Boise, Idaho.

None of the Tennessee victims has been publicly identified, but all are presumed to be civilians, officials from the fire command center told Reuters.

As many as 45 people have been reported injured.

The blaze erupted on Nov 23, Thanksgiving eve, in a remote area of rugged, hard-to-reach terrain dubbed Chimney Tops in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park near Gatlinburg, authorities said. — Reuters