5 of the 10 largest wildfires in recorded California history now currently burning
The devastating North Complex burning in Northern California is now the fifth-largest wildfire in recorded state history, fire officials say.
The complex, which has killed at least 15 people in the Sierra Nevada foothills, is reported at 287,181 acres (about 449 square miles) as of a Friday morning joint incident report from Cal Fire and the U.S. Forest Service.
On Thursday, it surpassed the Thomas Fire, which scorched over 281,000 acres in Ventura and Santa Barbara counties in late 2017, to become California’s No. 5 largest fire by acreage since 1932, when reliable records began.
With the North Complex growth, the state’s flurry of fires that sparked in August amid thousands of lightning strikes now include four of the five largest wildfires ever recorded in California. All are still burning, but two of them are approaching full containment, fire authorities say.
The state’s largest-ever wildfire, the massive 824,118-acre August Complex at Mendocino National Forest in Tehama County, which is nearly 1,300 square miles, is 30% contained. The 396,000-acre SCU Lightning Complex in the South Bay and 363,000-acre LNU Lightning Complex in the North Bay area, No. 3 and No. 4 respectively, are each reported at 98% containment, with the vast majority of fire activity halted, Cal Fire says. The North Complex is reported at 41% containment, Cal Fire and the U.S. Forest Service said Friday morning.
No. 2 on the all-time list, the Mendocino Complex, burned more than 459,000 acres in 2018.
With 15 reported fatalities, the North Complex is also tied for fifth-deadliest in state history.
A fifth fire, the Creek Fire burning in Sierra National Forest, broke through the top 10 on the superlative list on Friday. The blaze in Fresno and Madera counties is 248,256 acres (387.9 square miles) and 20% contained.
Latest on North Complex, West Zone
The Plumas County Sheriff’s Office on Thursday morning issued a new mandatory evacuation order for the community of Meadow Valley, as another round of gusty wind was expected to impact the North Complex fire area.
Previous orders remain in place for the Plumas County communities of La Porte and Bucks Lake. Mandatory evacuations are also in place for the Butte County communities of Berry Creek, Brush Creek, Feather Falls and Lumpkins, according to sheriff’s officials. Communities north and east of Brownsville in Yuba County also remain under evacuation orders, including Challenge, Forbestown, Woodleaf, Clipper Mills and Strawberry Valley.
Numerous other voluntary evacuation warnings and road closures remain in place throughout the three counties as crews continue to battle the wildfire.
The North Complex has destroyed more than 1,200 structures, including hundreds of homes, according to Friday’s incident update.
The vast majority of destruction and all of the confirmed fatalities to date have come on the West Zone of the complex, which erupted early last week amid extremely gusty winds. The West Zone, then referred to as the Bear Fire, spread southwest of its origin point near Plumas National Forest at a furious pace, sweeping into communities north of Lake Oroville on Sept. 8-9 after jumping the Middle Fork of the Feather River.
The West Zone largely destroyed the town of Berry Creek, which had a population of about 1,200 people and was urgently evacuated last week. Butte County sheriff and coroner’s officials as of Thursday had identified 13 of the 15 victims killed in the West Zone. Eleven were residents of Berry Creek, and the other two lived in Feather Falls.
The West Zone is now reported at 78,372 acres and is 43% contained, Cal Fire says.
Red-flag fire weather conditions returned near the North Complex on Thursday and Friday due to a cold front, according to the National Weather Service, and southwest gusts reached about 35 mph near the fire area.
Both Cal Fire and the Forest Service reported Friday morning that activity on the fire’s three zones — north, south and west — remained relatively calm overnight. The Forest Service says winds are expected to “gradually diminish” Friday afternoon, but gusts near 20 mph are still possible until then.
But Cal Fire also said Friday that the wind is expected to bring smoke from the record-setting August Complex, more than 100 miles to the west, over the North Complex. That could impact visibility and the ability to use aircraft support in containing the fire, which is burning in steep, rugged terrain with difficult access for ground crews.
About 3,000 firefighters are battling the North Complex, with over 1,800 of them assigned to the West Zone, Cal Fire says.
Climate change and California wildfires
Wildfires have always been part of life in California. The past four years have brought some of the most destructive and deadliest wildfires in the state’s modern history.
Nearly 180 people have lost their lives since 2017. More than 41,000 structures have been destroyed and nearly 7 million acres have burned – that’s roughly the size of Massachusetts.
So far this year, a record 3.4 million acres have burned and 25 people have died, according to Cal Fire.
Meanwhile, this year’s August was the hottest on record in California. A rare series of lightning storms sparked a series of fires, including the August Complex that has burned roughly 840,000 acres, making it the largest wildfire in California’s recorded history.
Our climate is becoming more severe.
The 2017 wildfire season occurred during the second hottest year on record in California and included a devastating string of fires in October that killed 44 people and destroyed nearly 9,000 buildings in Napa, Lake, Sonoma, Mendocino, Butte and Solano counties.
The following year was the most destructive and deadliest for wildfires in the state’s history. It included the Camp Fire, which destroyed the town of Paradise and killed 85 people and the enormous Mendocino Complex, which at 459,123 acres was the largest wildfire in the state’s history at the time.
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