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.
“The resources that have been on these fires for the past 72 hours are the same resources that have been out there for the last 72 hours,” California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (Cal Fire) Unit Chief Shana Jones told reporters in Calistoga.
“They are fully engaged and happy to do so to protect you. However it is imperative you hear the message … you have to evacuate when we ask you to.”
Police, sheriff’s deputies and firefighters urged residents near fires to be ready to leave at a moment’s notice.
“This is an incredibly emotional and stressful time for many of us who have endured many fires and natural disasters over the last couple of years,” Sonoma County Sheriff Mark Essick said.
“We realize this is a trigger point for many in the public and we ask you that you please go to your plan, we’ve all been working on this for the last couple of years, be ready and follow the plan when it comes time to evacuate.”
- 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 afternoon, 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 afternoon, 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.
Cal Fire issued new evacuation orders on Wednesday for neighborhoods in the path of SCU and LNU blazes — but Cal Fire Deputy Chief Sean Kavanaugh said residents should feel free to leave on their own, even without a formal order.
“If you have a ‘go bag,’ have some stuff packed up, ready to to go, if you feel any type of threat whatsoever, make that decision, make that decision to please leave your home,” Kavanaugh said.
“The last thing we want is for people to be trapped in their homes and not be able to get out.”
Recent high temperatures combined with arid conditions and parched land left much of Northern California in danger of lightning-sparked blazes, according to University of Nevada, Reno physics professor Neil Lareau, who specializes in the atmospheric conditions of wildfires.
“The lightning storms have been the driver for the outbreak,” Lareau told NBC News on Wednesday.
“The heat and aridity and the dryness of fuels — and we’ve seen year after year, hotter summers. And if you look at metrics that look at things like the ‘thirst’ of the atmosphere: as it gets hotter the capacity to draw water tends to draw water more efficiently.”
By midday Wednesday, numerous communities in the urban Bay Area were under alert from unhealthy air.
Residents in Oakland and San Jose and 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 posted Wednesday afternoon by the Bay Area Air Quality Management District.
San Jose State University shut down all in-person and online classes and meetings due to the fires.
“Everyone please be safe! Fires surrounding the city and region. Air Quality is very poor,” San Jose State Provost and Senior Vice President of Academic Affairs Vincent J. Del Casino Jr. said in a statement.
“Faculty, staff, and students – let’s continue to support each other and be flexible as we manage this latest emergency.”
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.
Kathryn Prociv contributed.
