At least five dead as town burns and 150,000 flee raging infernos
MILLIONS of Americans were under threat last night as six fast-moving killer fires ripped through California.
At least five people have died in the “destroyed” town of Paradise and more than 150,000 people have had to flee.
At its height, one of the blazes was “growing uncontrollably” at a rate of 80 football pitches a minute.
Celebrities were among those ordered to flee A-lister haunts Malibu and Calabasas.
Kim Kardashian said: “Just landed back home and had one hour to pack up and evacuate our home. I pray everyone is safe.” In all, more than 20 million people were under red flag alerts last night – facing a threat of “extreme fire behaviour”. One blaze – Camp Fire, in Butte County, in the north of the state – had grown to 70,000 acres yesterday. The five
PANIC Survivors embrace Wall of smoke spreads across Butte County Blaze claims the town’s Feather River Hospital bodies in the Butte County town of Paradise had been found in gutted vehicles in the same area of town.
Sheriff-Coroner Kory Honea said: “Due to the burn injuries, identification could not be immediately made.”
Paradise resident Whitney Vaughn said that as people were driving out of town many abandoned their vehicles, “running with babies and kids”.
She added: “Someone rammed our
vehicle. There were no firefighters in sight and I am hoping all of these people made it out.”
Yesterday worried keepers at LA Zoo were beginning to evacuate the animals.
Woolsey Fire, which is threatening Ventura and Los Angeles counties, had grown to 12,000 acres by morning.
The blaze is one of two burning just miles from the site of Wednesday night’s gun tragedy in Thousand Oaks.
The other uncontrollable blaze – Hill Fire – torched 10,000 acres in six hours.
Jason Bauer helped his parents flee Bell Canyon in Ventura County. He said: “The flames just came out of nowhere.”