Calif. blaze erupts near site of deadliest U.S. wildfire
PULGA, Calif. — A California fire churned through unpopulated mountain wilderness Thursday, but posed no immediate threat to the nearby town of Paradise, site of the deadliest wildfire in recent U.S. history. Still, survivors of the 2018 blaze worried that history could repeat itself.
The Dixie Fire had burned 3.5 square miles of brush and timber near the Feather River Canyon area of Butte County northeast of Paradise and moved into national forest land in neighboring Plumas County.
There was zero containment and officials kept in place a warning for residents of the tiny communities of Pulga and east Concow to be ready to leave.
In its early hours, the fire raced along steep and hardto-reach terrain about 10 miles from Paradise, the foothill town that was virtually incinerated by the Camp Fire that killed 85 people. The current fire, which erupted in the rugged Feather River Valley northeast of Paradise, has not advanced toward the town, and residents have not been ordered to evacuate.
Larry Peterson, whose home in neighboring Magalia survived the previous blaze, said some of his neighbors were getting their belongings together in case they had to flee.
“Anytime you’ve got a fire after what we went through, and another one is coming up, you’ve got to be concerned,” he told KHSL-TV.
Joyce Mclean’s home burned last time but she has rebuilt it and will again if necessary, she told the station.
“We just take each day as it comes and if it happens, it happens,” Ms. Mclean said. “There’s not much that we can do about it.”
Because little of the foliage has grown back in the area since the 2018 Paradise blaze, there is nothing there now for the current fire to burn, Butte County Supervisor Bill Connelly told the Sacramento Bee.
“It’s probably not a direct threat at this time,” he said. The blaze is one of nearly 70 active wildfires that have destroyed homes and burned through about 1,562 square miles — a combined area larger than Rhode Island — in a dozen mostly Western states, according to the National Interagency Fire Center.
In southern Oregon the Bootleg Fire, the largest wildfire currently burning in the U.S., covered more than 355 square miles early Thursday after a day of extreme behavior and explosive growth. Twenty-one homes have been destroyed and another 1,900 remained threatened in the Fremont-Winema National Forest area just north of California that’s been gripped by a historic drought.
The nearby Log Fire, which originated as three tiny fires on Monday, ballooned to more than 7½ square miles as winds pushed the flames eastward through wilderness.
Tim and Dee McCarley could see trees exploding into flames in their rearview mirror as they fled the fire last week at the last minute. They had put off their departure to pack more belongings and search for their missing cat.
“The sheriff’s department had been there and they said, ‘If you don’t get out of here now, then you are going to die,’ ” said Tim McCarley, 67, as he, his wife and stepson rested Wednesday at a shelter at the Klamath County Fairgrounds.
Mr. McCarley was allowed to return briefly after the fire had passed over their rural community northwest of Bly. He found his home still standing and their cat inside unharmed. But the flames had crept within 5 feet of their house, the heat melting their trailer and storage units until they looked “like a melted beer can,” he told The Associated Press.
The National Weather Service tweeted late Wednesday that a “terrifying” satellite image showed gigantic clouds fueled by smoke and hot air had formed over the fire — a sign that the blaze was so intense it was creating its own weather, with erratic winds and the potential for fire-generated lightning.
“Please send positive thoughts and well wishes to the firefighters. ... It’s a tough time for them right now,” the tweet read.