Brown asks Trump for aid on wildfires
California fights 17 blazes as weather turns dicey
SAN FRANCISCO – Gov. Jerry Brown on Saturday called on President Donald Trump to help California fight and recover from another devastating wildfire season.
Brown inspected neighborhoods wiped out by a wildfire in the Northern California city of Redding. The Democratic governor said he was confident the Republican president he has clashed with over immigration and pollution policies would send aid, which Trump did last year when the California’s wine country was hit hard.
“The president has been pretty good on helping us in disasters so I’m hopeful,” Brown said. “Tragedies bring people together.”
Authorities said there are 17 major fires burning throughout California. In all, they have destroyed hundreds of homes, killed eight people and shut down Yosemite National Park.
“Fire season is really just beginning,” said California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection chief Ken Pimlott.
The biggest blazes continue to burn north of San Francisco, including tw in wildfires fueled by dry vegetation and hot, windy weather. Those fires destroyed 55 homes and forced thousands of residents to flee their neighborhoods about 100 miles north of the city. They have grown to almost 250 square miles.
The National Weather Service issued red flag warnings of critical fire weather conditions through Saturday night, saying a series of dry low-pressure systems passing through the region could bring wind gusts of up to 35 mph that could turn small fires or even sparks into racing walls of flames.
As a precaution, new evacuations were called Friday for an area of Mendocino and Lake counties where the week-old twin fires are threatening about 9,000 homes.
Cal Fire officials said the so-called Carr Fire, which killed six people and incinerated 1,067 homes, started two weeks ago with sparks from the steel rim of a towed-trailer’s flat tire.
The blaze is currently 41 percent contained.
In the Sierra Nevada, firefighters achieved 41percent containment of a forest fire that has shut down Yosemite Valley and other adjacent portions of Yosemite National Park at what is normally the height of summer tourism.