Tag Archives: San Francisco Bay

Fast-spreading California wildfire forces evacuations in Yolo County

Smoke rises in distance from County Fire near County Road 63 and Highway 16 in Rumsey Canyon in this #CountyFire image on social media in Brooks, California, U.S., July 2, 2018. Courtesy California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection/Handout via REUTERS

By Jon Herskovitz

(Reuters) – A fast-growing wildfire that broke out over the weekend in Northern California, fueled by parched lands and high winds, prompted evacuations on Sunday and sent ash spewing over a wide area of the region, officials said.

More than 1,200 people were fighting the so-called County Fire, located about 75 miles (120 kms) northeast of San Francisco. It has blazed through around 32,500 acres (13,150 hectares) and was 2 percent contained as of Sunday evening, officials said.

The sky turned orange in parts of the San Francisco Bay area due to the blaze, with many residents waking up to a thin coating of ash on windows, cars and lawns.

Residents in some rural areas of Yolo County were ordered to leave their homes as the flames advanced, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, or Cal Fire.

“It’s going to be headed into some populated areas of small communities in the near future if it is not curtailed,” Cal Fire spokesman Scott McLean said in an interview.

As of June 29 of this year, wildfires have burned through nearly 2.5 million acres (1 million hectares) in the United States, well above the average of about 2 million acres for the same calendar period over the last 10 years, according to the National Interagency Fire Center, a monitoring group.

Parched conditions in the U.S. West and Southwest have led to a rash of wildfires this year, with about 40 major blazes burning as of the end of June in an area from Washington State to New Mexico, the agency said.

More than 9,000 firefighters and 100 helicopters have been dispatched to battle the various blazes, cutting containment lines on the ground and dropping fire retardant from the air, the agency said.

California and Colorado have been hard hit this year, with the largest wildfire in Colorado, the 416 Fire, charring almost 47,000 acres about 13 miles (21 km) north of Durango in the southwestern part of the state. It is 37 percent contained, according to state data.

An ongoing drought across much of the Southwest and West and a ridge of warm air that can produce high winds have made the area susceptible to wildfires, said Scott Marsh, a meteorologist with the U.S. National Weather Service Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Oklahoma.

“In a drought-stricken area, once you get a spark, it is off to the races,” he said.

(Reporting by Jon Herskovitz; Editing by Paul Simao & Simon Cameron-Moore)

Earthquake in Gulf of Alaska sparks brief California tsunami fears

Vehicles are seen during a tsunami warning evacuation in Kodiak, Alaska, U.S., January 23, 2018 in this still image obtained from social media video. Instagram @JUPITERTHEPRODUCER.ASTORIA via REUTERS

By Yereth Rosen

ANCHORAGE (Reuters) – Alaska and parts of western Canada braced for a possible tsunami on Tuesday after a magnitude-7.9 earthquake struck the Gulf of Alaska, sparking evacuations in coastal Alaska and a tsunami warning for California that was later lifted.

In Alaska, people packed into high schools and other evacuation centers after the quake hit shortly after midnight local time (0900 GMT).

Officials had warned residents as far south as San Francisco to be ready to evacuate coastal areas but later lifted tsunami watches for California, Oregon and Washington states as well as coastal British Colombia in Canada.

In Alaska, where a tsunami advisory remained in place as of 3:12 a.m. local time (1212 GMT).

Residents gathered in shelters on Kodiak Island, the closest land point to the quake, around 160 miles (250 km) southeast of Chiniak, Alaska, at a depth of 25 km – considered shallow but with broader damage – according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

There were no immediate reports of injuries or damage from the quake, which was initially measured at magnitude 8.2.

“People are fine,” said Neil Hecht, assistant principal of Kodiak High School, which was sheltering a few hundred people. “Spirits are high. Everyone is doing well here.”

Long lines of traffic formed in coastal communities including Homer and Seward, Alaska, residents warned on social media.

In Homer, a few hundred cars were packed into its high school parking lot. Shawn Biessel, a 32-year-old park ranger, and his mother were in the lot, a few hundred feet above sea level.

“It was a really obvious, pretty strong, long quake. A good rumbler,” Biessel said in a phone interview. “It went on for a solid minute and after a while we thought we should get outside.”

Police drove through Biessel’s neighborhood with flashing lights to alert residents to evacuate, Biessel said.

“Please heed local warnings to move inland or to higher ground,” Alaska Governor Bill Walker said in a statement.

San Francisco’s Department of Emergency Management briefly warned residents within three blocks of the Pacific Ocean or five blocks of San Francisco Bay to prepare to evacuate. That warning was lifted when the tsunami watch was lifted.

An initial tsunami watch for Hawaii was canceled.

Japan’s meteorological agency said it was monitoring the situation but did not issue a tsunami alert.

(Additional reporting by Brendan O’Brien in Milwaukee and Andrea Hopkins in Ottawa; Writing by Scott Malone and Robin Pomeroy; Editing by John Stonestreet and Jeffrey Benkoe)