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| The Camp Fire burns in Paradise, Calif. (The Associated Press photo by Noah Berger) |
Tens of thousands of homes have been evacuated because of three fast-moving wildfires in California.
Paradise, a town of 27,000 north of Sacramento, was quickly overtaken by the Camp Fire, which started around 6:30 a.m. Thousands fled their homes. Capt. Scott McLean, a spokesman for the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, said "Pretty much the community of Paradise is destroyed — it's that kind of devastation," David Li and Alex Johnson report for NBC.
The Camp Fire is now at 70,000 acres and is only 5 percent contained, according to the Chico Enterprise-Record in Chico, a city of about 90,000 near Paradise. The flames have reached but not penetrated Chico.
Evacuation from Paradise was difficult because the town is on a ridge and has limited escape routes, Stephen Lam reports for Reuters.
The other two fires are affecting more urban areas in the southern part of the state, though some surrounding small towns have been evacuated. The Woolsey Fire is down in Thousand Oaks, northwest of Los Angeles, and the Hill Fire has reached 10,000 acres in Ventura County, Lam reports.
Large town – a large town has a population of 20,000 to 100,000.
ReplyDeleteTown – a town has a population of 1,000 to 20,000.
Village – a village is a human settlement or community that is larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town. A village generally does not have many services, most likely a church or only a small shop or post office. The population of a village varies; the average population can range from hundreds to thousands.