Where California’s wildfires are burning. Updates on destruction, containment and evacuations
California is besieged once again by yet another series of intense wildfires, with two new major incidents erupting amid extremely gusty winds and otherwise critical wildfire weather conditions that kicked in over the weekend.
Both the Zogg Fire in Shasta County and the Glass Fire in Napa and Sonoma counties have charred more than 48,000 acres and are still burning with minimal containment as of Wednesday morning, according to Cal Fire.
At least three civilians have died in the Zogg Fire, Shasta sheriff’s authorities said Monday. In the North Bay’s Wine Country region, the Glass Fire — a cluster of conjoined fires, merged into one blaze — forced tens of thousands to evacuate after sparking early Sunday and erupting in size later that evening and overnight.
About 35,000 residents inside Santa Rosa city limits were ordered to evacuate by early Monday, and by later that evening, all 5,000-plus residents of the city of Calistoga were under a mandatory evacuation order. Angwin, a town of 3,000 people, was ordered evacuated Tuesday morning.
Cal Fire Incident Commander Billy See in a Tuesday morning news conference said the Glass Fire is yet another for California burning in one of the state’s wildland-urban “interface” areas.
“Here in California, with all these interface areas, these fires become very disastrous with the amount of structures and populations impacted,” See said.
Gov. Gavin Newsom late Monday declared a state emergency for Napa, Sonoma and Shasta counties due to the two new wildfires. The Newsom administration also requested a major disaster declaration from the president in response to those fires, in order to access further support Federal Emergency Management Agency.
The Zogg Fire deaths bring California’s confirmed death toll for the current wildfire season up to 29. At least 15 perished in the West Zone of the North Complex earlier this month as it ravaged Berry Creek, Feather Falls and other Butte County communities north of Lake Oroville.
California is already under a statewide emergency issued by Newsom on Aug. 18 due to “widespread fires and extreme weather conditions” this wildfire season. 2020 has already been a record-smashing year for wildfire by land area — over 3.8 million acres have burned, the most of any year on record in California, according to Cal Fire. The current fire year includes five of the six largest wildfires recorded since 1932, all of which have sparked since mid-August.
Elevating some of the chaos and uncertainty of the recent wildfires, tens of thousands of homes and businesses across Northern Californians have been without power for days, the product of both deliberate public safety power shutoffs by Pacific Gas and Electric Co. that were announced in advance in response to the gusty wind forecast, or as a direct result of the two new major wildfire incidents.
PG&E said it had restored power by late Monday to practically all of the 65,000 homes and businesses affected by its public safety power shutoff. But another 24,000 customers lost power due to the Glass and Zogg fires. In some cases, PG&E said it cut power in consultation with Cal Fire “and for the safety of firefighters in active fire damages or due to damage caused” by the fires.
The utility added that it has “no indication” that either fire was ignited by its equipment. PG&E was driven into bankruptcy in January 2019 by billions of dollars in liabilities from the 2017 wine country fires and 2018 Camp Fire; the company emerged from Chapter 11 this summer. PG&E said inspections after its latest deliberate blackout uncovered “13 instances of weather-related damages and hazards,” including downed power lines, which the utility company says could have ignited new fires if the lines hadn’t been blacked out.
Here are the latest updates on significant wildfire incidents burning across California as of Wednesday morning.
Glass Fire
Updated: 7 a.m. Wednesday | Size: 48,440 acres (75.7 square miles) | Containment: 2%
The Glass Fire roared toward the North Bay city of Santa Rosa earlier this week, destroying dozens of homes and long-standing wineries as it burned up to the city’s eastern edge and outskirts.
The fire has destroyed at least 80 homes, Cal Fire said Tuesday morning: 52 in Napa County and 28 in Sonoma have been confirmed destroyed, according to the state fire agency. The totals are preliminary based on early information, and could grow substantially as damage is further assessed, but those destruction totals remained unchanged as of Wednesday morning’s update.
Nearly 11,000 more structures remain threatened by the fire, which prompted urgent evacuations late Sunday through Monday.
Roughly 75,000 residents of Sonoma and Napa counties have been ordered to leave, and thousands more were still under warnings or advisories — meaning pack up and be ready to go at a moment’s notice — as of Tuesday morning.
Napa County emergency officials said just before 11 a.m. that evacuation warnings have been upgraded to mandatory orders for the town of Angwin, where more than 3,000 people live, and immediately surrounding areas.
In a joint news conference Tuesday morning, authorities said the Glass Fire is now being classified in two zones. The West Zone of the Glass Fire includes Sonoma County, and its East Zone is in Napa County. Aircraft have assisted operations in the East Zone, but have been unavailable on the West Zone due to poor visibility from smoke.
See, the Cal Fire incident commander, said Tuesday that the Glass Fire is burning right between the burn scars of the devastating 2017 wine country fires, specifically the Tubbs, Dunn and Adobe fires.
“This land has no fire history that’s been recorded. It’s burning in all the area that was saved in 2017.”
After earlier chaos and frantic evacuation orders poured in late Sunday and early Monday, no new orders were issued late Monday through Tuesday morning up until the Angwin evacuation.
Sonoma County Sheriff Mark Essick said orders including parts of Santa Rosa and unincorporated Sonoma totaled more than 68,000 evacuations as of Monday afternoon, while Napa County officials said at least 6,000 Napa residents had been ordered to evacuate as of that time.
Then, later that evening, authorities expanded a mandatory evacuation for Calistoga, initially in place for just its southern portion, telling the entire city to get out.
The extremely gusty winds that fueled the fire’s intense growth Sunday and Monday have subsided, but Cal Fire’s incident reports note that “very minimal humidity recovery” and above-average temperatures in the area are continuing to create a challenge in containing the blaze.
Nearly 1,500 firefighters were battling the Glass Fire as of 7 p.m. Monday, Cal Fire said.
Zogg Fire
Updated: 7:04 a.m. Wednesday | Size: 51,955 acres (81.2 square miles) | Containment: 7%
The Zogg Fire started Sunday afternoon north of the Shasta County towns of Igo and Ono, several miles southwest of Redding, and exploded in size at an extreme pace that evening. Cal Fire increased its reported size from 400 acres to 7,000 acres within a few hours.
The wildfire has surpassed 50,000 acres as of Wednesday morning. Fueled by strong winds through a rural area of Shasta County, the blaze exploded in size late Sunday into early Monday, and remained uncontained until late Tuesday, Cal Fire.
“Every area of this fire is a concern,” Cal Fire spokeswoman Toni Davis said early Tuesday, when containment was 0%. The fire is 7% contained as of Wednesday morning’s incident update.
Shasta County Sheriff Eric Magrini announced Monday afternoon that three people had died in the Zogg Fire. He did not provide any additional details on those deaths. Magrini said coroner officials were working to positively identify the bodies recovered and properly notify their families.
As of Wednesday morning, Cal Fire also reported at least one civilian injury in addition to the three fatalities.
Already 146 buildings have been destroyed and another 1,538 are threatened, the agency said. At a late Monday news briefing, Cal Fire officials said the fire was moving south through heavy grasslands in an area that burned in the 2018 Carr Fire.
Magrini urged residents to comply with evacuation orders.
“When you hear that order, evacuate immediately. Do not wait,” the sheriff said during a 4 p.m. news conference Monday.
Redding is not considered to be at risk from the Zogg Fire, city officials said Monday.
North Complex
Updated: 7 a.m. Tuesday | Size: 308,995 acres (478.3 square miles) | Containment: 76%
Heavy wind gusts in the Sierra Nevada foothills Sunday and Monday tested containment of the existing North Complex, a cluster of wildfires that have been burning in Butte and Plumas counties since Aug. 17, fire officials said.
With this week’s winds having died down in the region, Cal Fire said in a Tuesday morning update that containment lines on the West Zone “held throughout the wind event, and no further fire growth is expected” on the nearly 85,000-acre zone, one of three that make up the 309,000-acre fire complex.
Cal Fire’s Butte unit now reports the West Zone at 95% containment, and sheriff’s officials announced the lifting or downgrading of evacuation orders for Feather Falls, Forbestown, Clipper Mills and all areas south of Lake Oroville. Yuba County lifted all remaining evacuation orders and warnings related to the West Zone.
Outside of the West Zone, though, the recent wind event prompted new evacuation orders and warnings along the Highway 70 corridor Sunday and Monday, local emergency officials and the U.S. Forest Service said.
What began as a spot fire Sunday afternoon “has grown to within several hundred yards of Highway 70 near Grizzly Dome Tunnel,” the Forest Service said in a Tuesday morning incident report. “Growing uncontained fireline” in that area resulted in reported containment on the North Complex to drop from 78% to 76%.
The Butte County Sheriff’s Office placed Pulga, Concow, Big Bend and Yankee Hill under mandatory evacuation orders late Sunday evening due to this flare-up, and put Stirling City and Magalia under evacuation warnings. The town of Paradise, which was largely destroyed by the 2018 Camp Fire, issued its own evacuation warning including the entire town.
The sprawling North Complex sparked by lightning Aug. 17 and swelled in size at a moderate pace for weeks before a Sept. 7 wind event led its southwest flank on a furious sprint toward Lake Oroville. The West Zone, at the time referred to as the Bear Fire, overwhelmed communities north of Lake Oroville, killing 15 people.
Creek Fire
Updated: Tuesday | Size: 305,240 acres (476.9 square miles) | Containment: 44%
The Creek Fire has grown a few thousand acres this week.
Cal Fire officials said Tuesday evening the fire was 44% contained, with 305,240 total acres burned. The estimated containment date has been pushed back to Oct. 31, and its cause remains under investigation.
The fire is located along both sides of the San Joaquin River near Mammoth Pool, Shaver Lake, Big Creek, and Huntington Lake.
August Complex
Updated: 7:45 a.m. Wednesday | Size: 949,055 acres (1,482.9 square miles) | Containment: 43%
The largest fire in state history continues to burn in the Mendocino and Shasta-Trinity national forests. After increased wind activity on Monday, fire officials issued new evacuation orders for Lower Dick Road and the Bauer Subdivision in Mendocino County.
On Tuesday, Shasta-Trinity officials said structures and power lines in the Ruth/Forest Glen are were damaged or destroyed by “two days of powerful, wind-driven fire.”
Earlier Monday, evacuation orders were lowered in many other areas previously threatened by the blaze that was sparked by lightning Aug. 16. A full list is on the Mendocino National Forest’s Facebook page. Fifty-one structures have been destroyed, Cal Fire said.
Other fires burning in California
▪ The Fork Fire, burning since Sept. 8 in the Eldorado National Forest, started in the Crystal Basin near Gerle Creek under critical fire weather conditions. It is 70% contained as of Monday after burning 1,667 acres.
▪ The Dolan Fire continues to burn in Monterey County after starting Aug. 19, near Dolan Road and Highway 1 about 15 miles southeast of Big Sur. It has charred 128,417 acres and is 71% contained.
▪ The Slater Fire, which started Sept. 7, is being managed along with the 8,173-acre Devil Fire, which began Sept. 9. The fires are burning on the Klamath, Six Rivers and Rogue-Siskiyou National Forests in Siskiyou and Del Norte counties, as well as in Oregon’s Josephine County. It has burned 154,102 acres (240.8 square miles) and is 18% contained, fire officials said.
Fires nearing full containment
▪ Full containment is expected as early as Wednesday for the LNU Lightning Complex, the massive North Bay fires that were started by lightning Aug. 16. The Hennessey Fire is currently 305,651 acres and 98% contained, the Walbridge Fire is currently 55,209 acres and 98% contained and the Meyers Fire is 2,360 acres and 100% contained, Cal Fire said in its latest update. Altogether, the complex has charred 363,220 acres (567.5 square miles) and destroyed 1,491 structures in Solano, Napa and Sonoma counties.
▪ Full containment could occur Wednesday for the SCU Lightning Complex, the massive lightning-sparked fire that consumed 396,624 acres (619.7 square miles) across Santa Clara, Alameda, Contra Costa, San Joaquin and Stanislaus counties. After burning since Aug. 18, firefighters said the blaze is 98% contained.
This story was originally published September 29, 2020 at 9:03 AM with the headline "Where California’s wildfires are burning. Updates on destruction, containment and evacuations."
