Lightning-sparked wildfires swept across Northern California on Wednesday, scorching huge swaths of sun-parched land and leading to orders for thousands to evacuate, officials said.
Smoke from more than three dozen blazes in counties just outside the cities of San Francisco, San Jose and Oakland led to alerts in some Bay Area communities for residents to stay inside.
Firefighters had their hands full across nearly every part of the region. Eight of the nine counties that make up the Bay Area were fighting fires on Wednesday, all but San Francisco.
“Throughout the state of California right now, we are stretched thin for crews,” California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (Cal Fire) spokesman Will Powers said. “Air resources have been stretched thin throughout the whole state.”
- About 20 fires that were being tracked as the single SCU (Santa Clara Unit) Lightning Complex Fire had consumed 85,000 acres with about 5-percent containment by Wednesday morning, Cal Fire said. These blazes are in the counties of Santa Clara, Alameda, Contra Costa, San Joaquin, and Stanislaus.
- Eight fires connected to lightning strikes in Napa and Sonoma Counties, called the LNU (Sonoma-Lake-Napa Unit) Lightning Complex Fire had consumed more than 46,000 acres by Wednesday morning, with no containment, Cal Fire said.
- Five fires in San Mateo and Santa Cruz Counties – dubbed the CZU August Lightning Complex – broke out on Monday night and had scorched 10,000 acres by Wednesday morning. One of those blazes was only 5 percent contained and the other four had zero containment, Cal Fire said.
In the San Mateo and Santa Cruz County fires, about 22,000 people were ordered to evacuated from the region that’s marked by dense wooded parkland,
“This is a very active timber fire burning in two counties with a serious threat to both public safety and for structures that are out in front of it,” said Jonathan Cox, another Cal Fire spokesman.
And by Wednesday morning, numerous communities in the urban Bay Area were under alert from unhealthy air.
Residents of bedroom communities such as Pleasanton, in the East Bay, and Redwood City, south of San Francisco, were asked to stay indoors due to the smoke, according to data from the Bay Area Air Quality Management District.
Children, pregnant women, the elderly or those with underlying health conditions were asked to stay inside in East Oakland.
Firefighters had a long day ahead of them, battling flames and blistering temperatures around Northern California. The mercury was expected to hit 102 degrees in Sacramento, 98 in Napa and Vacaville, 96 in Santa Rosa and 94 in San Jose.
This is a developing story, please refresh here for updates.
Associated Press and Kathryn Prociv contributed.
