West Coast Wildfires Force Thousands to Evacuate

By Mary Anne R. Oct 16 2020, 02:53 AM EDT

About four dozen uncontained wildfires are burning on the West Coast, with around 21 of those wildfires burning in California alone.

Dry conditions and gusty winds in Southern California helped spread the Bruder Fire east of Los Angeles, which forced evacuations.

Currently, 21 wildfires are burning in California, of which 12 are major.On Wednesday, Anaheim hit 96 degrees; Ontario was at 99 degrees; Napa at 94 degrees; and Phoenix at 100 degrees.

According to AP News, over 70,000 people were under evacuation orders in the wine region in California.

Mandatory evacuations are also posted in Colorado. On Wednesday, the Cameron Peak Fire in Colorado scorched another 23,000 acres. That makes it the biggest wildfire in the state of Colorado's history at 164,000 acres.

The Larimer County Sheriff's Office in Colorado said around 10,000 evacuation orders were sent, as KDVR reported.

In the state of Oregon, there have been 500,000 evacuees, as per NPR's report.

California Wildfire

A record-breaking wildfire in Southern California may have been caused by tree branches coming into contact with power equipment, according to a Fox News report.

In a letter to the California Public Utilities Commission, Southern California Edison said investigators from the U.S. Forest Service had taken a 23-foot-long line of a conductor.

The said conductor belongs to the utility, which is an "H-Frame structure" with two power poles and three tree branches.

The letter was released after the utility filed a notice with the agency, saying there was an "incident" on their grid.

The said incident was around the time of the Bobcat Fire, which started on Sept. 6. The wildfire was reported near the Cogswell Dam in National Forest.

The utility noted in its letter that cameras in the area showed smoke was already forming around 12:10 p.m., which was before the grid incident.

"Although USFS has not shared the details of its investigation with SCE, it appears that USFS is investigating whether vegetation was involved in the ignition of the fire," the utility said in a Fox News report.

California Power Cuts

Meanwhile, thousands of residents in northern California were without power on Thursday as a heatwave brought another round of extreme wildfire threat.

According to a The Guardian report, the utility company Pacific Gas & Electric started shutting off power on Wednesday evening, affecting around 50,000 customers. An additional 20,000 people were expected to lose power later on Thursday.

Mark Quinlan, PG&E's incident commander, told The Guardian that the power outages were a "last-resort option." PG&E's power cuts aim to prevent equipment such as power lines from causing more wildfires if the winds blow them down.

PG&E has been found to cause two of the deadliest wildfires in California, including the 2018 wildfire that ravaged much of Paradise's town. The said wildfire was known to have killed 85 people.

Many counties affected by PG&E's power outages were already hit by huge wildfires. The Glass Fire, which affected the northern California wine region, was contained on Wednesday. It was after destroying over 1,500 homes and other infrastructures.

The Glass Fire affected the Napa and Sonoma counties.The Zogg Fire that ravaged the Shasta and Tehama counties was fully contained. However, four lives were taken with the Zogg Fire.