California wildfire deaths now 50
PARADISE (AFP) — At least 50 deaths have been reported in California so far from the late-season wildfires as thousands of firefighters battled blazes in the state’s northern and southern areas on Tuesday.
Body recovery teams searched the remains of houses and charred cars for victims of the deadliest wildfire in the history of the state.
With hundreds of people also unaccounted for, the toll is likely to rise.
Most of the fatalities have been caused by the so-called Camp Fire in and around the town of Paradise, population 26,000, in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountains about 80 miles north of Sacramento.
“Today, an additional six human remains were recovered, which brings the total to 48. All six of those remains were located in Paradise, and they were located within homes,” Sheriff Kory Honea told a news conference.
Another two deaths have been reported from the Woolsey Fire north of Los Angeles.
Paradise, which is home to many retirees and has experienced an unusually dry fall, was virtually razed to the ground by the fast-moving Camp Fire blaze.
Residents have recounted harrowing tales of fleeing the fires on foot with little more than the clothes on their backs.
Others escaped by driving through tunnels of smoke and fire as flames licked at their vehicles on gridlocked roads dotted with abandoned cars.
Melissa Schuster, a member of the Paradise town council, told ABC News that the entire town “is a toxic wasteland right now.”
“We have teams – you know, coroner teams – that have to go house to house and vehicle to vehicle,” Schuster told ABC.
The Camp Fire, which erupted on Thursday, has ravaged 50,600 hectares of land and is 35 percent contained, according to Cal Fire.
Butte County, where the blaze is located, has seen less than an inch of rainfall in more than 30 weeks.
The Camp Fire has destroyed more than 6,500 homes and 260 commercial properties. Battling the blaze are more than 5,600 fire personnel, some from as far away as Washington state and Texas.
The Woolsey Fire, which also began on Thursday, has razed 39,300 hectares and has been 40 percent contained.