LOS ANGELES (AFP) – The death toll from California’s raging wildfires rose to 38 on Saturday, with more than 10,000 firefighters battling 16 large blazes and 100,000 people evacuated, the state’s fire service said.
Around 864 square kilometers of residential neighborhoods, forests, and other property have been burned since Sunday, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.
“These fires have been extremely destructive, with 5,700 structures estimated to have been destroyed,” the service said in a statement.
Cal Fire later announced on its Twitter account that the death toll had risen from 35 in the morning to 38, with 20 of the fatalities occurring in Sonoma County alone, where more than 200 people are still missing.
Pre-dawn winds in Santa Rosa have complicated the effort, pushing a blaze known as the Nuns Fire in two separate directions and forcing thousands to evacuate their homes near Oakmont and northeast of the city of Sonoma, Cal Fire said.
Numerous churches across the region – in Santa Rosa, Napa, Sonoma, Petaluma, and Novato – were housing victims of the wildfires and serving as resting places for firefighters, according to the Sacramento Bee newspaper.
California Gov. Jerry Brown announced the White House had approved a request for direct aid for families in four counties, adding to emergency funds promised to the devastated winemaking areas of Napa and Sonoma.
