Northern California wildfire prompts evacuation orders

Sept. 3 (UPI) — Evacuation orders were issued Friday as a rapidly growing wildfire exploded in size near the town of Weed in Siskiyou County, Calif., according to authorities.

The Mill Fire exploded to 2,580 acres by Friday evening, moving with a “dangerous rate of spread,” the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection said. Updates on the fire had started just before 1 p.m., local time, that day. The department added that hundreds of homes were threatened by the fire.

The blaze is currently 0% contained.

Video from the Montague Fire Department showed the Mill Fire burning buildings along Highway 97 as the firefighters raced to the scene. The air was thick with smoke, and several homes and structures were already up in flames. It’s currently unknown exactly how many homes have been damaged or destroyed as of Friday afternoon.

Earlier that day, the Mill Fire jumped Jackson Ranch Road and started burning through the community of Lake Shastina, north of Weed, according to crews that were battling the fire.

Evacuation orders were issued for the communities of Weed, Lake Shastina and Edgewood as of 2 p.m. Friday. This extends to zones east of Highway 5 from Weed to Highway A12, south of A12 from Grenada to Highway 97 and west of Highway 97 from A12 to I-5. The Karuk Wellness Center in Yreka will be used as an evacuation center, and students who were at Weed High School on Friday were bussed to Mt. Shasta High School.

Siskiyou and Modoc counties, both in Northern California, were under a red flag warning Friday with dry air and windy conditions promoting the rapid spread of fire.

A heat wave in the West is forecast to send temperatures soaring past 100 degrees Fahrenheit in the coming days, bringing additional heat risks to those evacuating.

“Northern California is expecting near record-breaking heat throughout this weekend,” AccuWeather meteorologist Aaron Druckmiller said, adding that a 36 mph wind gust had been measured at Siskiyou County Airport, roughly 20 miles from Weed.

“The biggest thing to take away here is the dry conditions coupled with high winds have really raised the chance for intense fires like this one to spring up,” he said.