U.S. faces extreme temperatures, alarming fire in California

Oak Fire broke out Friday in Mariposa County, near Yosemite National Park and its giant sequoias, and has already moved over 2,500 hectares, destroying ten properties and damaging five others, according to a bulletin Saturday from the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. Several roads were cut and several areas were ordered to evacuate, while the fire, of extreme activity and fought by about 400 firefighters, was not at all controlled Saturday, according to the same source.

 

 According to a climatologist at the University of California, Los Angeles, Daniel Swain, the fire has spread significantly in nearly every direction amid high fuel loads and extreme drought. The series of relatively small, non-destructive wildfires in California so far this season appears to be over, he added on Twitter. The U.S. West has already seen wildfires of exceptional size and intensity in recent years, with a very sharp lengthening of the fire season, a phenomenon that scientists attribute to global warming.