What are the biggest fires in California history? LNU, SCU lightning complexes join the list

Update: 5 of the 6 largest California wildfires in history started in the past 6 weeks

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Nearly 12,000 firefighters are on the front lines of almost two dozen major wildfires and complexes, spanning the entire state of California. These wildfires have burned more than one million acres as of Sunday morning — roughly the land area of California’s 10 largest cities.

And now, two of the largest wildfires raging in Northern California have shot to the top of the state’s superlatives list.

The LNU Lightning Complex became the second-largest wildfire in California history on Friday night, jumping up to 341,243 acres by Sunday. It’s still well behind the all-time largest fire, the Mendocino Complex, which erupted in July 2018 in Lake and Mendocino counties and reached 459,123 acres before it was put out several months later. That’s about half of the size of Sacramento County or five times the size of the city of Sacramento.

Even on its own, the Hennessy Fire would make it to the state’s top five. The fire is the largest of the LNU fires and is mostly contained to Napa County. It had charred 287,811 acres and was 17% contained as of Sunday morning.

Meanwhile, the SCU Lightning Complex became the third-largest fire after chewing through 339,968 acres, according to Saturday update. That’s the equivalent of 11 San Franciscos. The fires are burning in three distinct zones within Santa Clara, Alameda, Stanislaus, Contra Costa and San Joaquin counties, Cal Fire said. These fires overtook the Thomas Fire in total acreage, which scorched 281,893 acres in Ventura and Santa Barbara counties in 2017.

This story was originally published August 22, 2020 at 3:30 PM with the headline "What are the biggest fires in California history? LNU, SCU lightning complexes join the list."