Status: 07/11/2021 2:19 p.m.
The western United States is currently ravaged by forest fires and temperatures around 50 degrees. In California, some of the extinguishing water from aircraft evaporates before it reaches the flames. Two firefighters were killed in Arizona.
The western United States is battling forest fires and a new heat wave. In the border area between the states of California and Nevada, a fire raged over an area of 222 square kilometers. In southern California, two Indian tribes had to leave their settlements because of a bush fire. 1200 firefighters fight a forest fire in the north of the US state.
Thrown fire-fighting water evaporates
During the forest fires in California, the air was so dry and hot that some of the fire-fighting water dropped by planes evaporated before it reached the ground, said fire department spokeswoman Lisa Cox. Smoke and hot air formed a massive pyrocumulus cloud that produced its own lightning strikes, Cox said.
The sparks of the forest fire started up to 1.6 kilometers and triggered new fires that the fire brigade could no longer reach. The wind drives the flames into parched ravines, where the fire finds plenty of food and can pick up speed.
Firefighters in Doyle fight the forest fires. Almost 1000 firefighters are working against the current fires.
Image: dpa
“It just runs over trees”
In addition, the firefighters discovered blazing flames in groups of trees and individual fires that were ignited by widely scattered embers, Cox told the Los Angeles Times. “This increases the rate at which the fire spreads because the fire is actually moving between the canopy of trees,” she said. “Basically, it just runs over the trees until it runs out of trees.”
Forest fires have also been reported from other states in the western United States: In southern Oregon, the wind fanned a forest fire that doubled its area of fire to 311 square kilometers on Saturday. In Washington State, a forest fire spread to 155 square kilometers.
Two firefighters die
Arizona did not have evictions due to a fire in Yavapai County, but two firefighters were killed in Mohave County. They were supposed to watch a forest fire with an airplane and crashed, as the authorities told the channel KPHO-TV.
Temperatures of over 50 degrees
The temperatures in the western United States are currently extremely high: in Death Valley National Park they reached 53 degrees Celsius on Saturday. The day before it was even 54 degrees, as the national weather service announced. If the data are confirmed, it would be the highest daily temperature recorded on earth in more than 100 years. The record dates from July 1913. At that time, 57 degrees were reached in the Californian desert town of Furnace Creek.
Scorching heat in San Diego and Las Vegas too
The temperatures are also high in other cities: The city of San Diego in California was breeding at 49 degrees Celsius on Saturday, in Las Vegas in the state of Nevada it was 47. The weather service warned that the heat could damage health.
In almost all of California and in large parts of Nevada, the highest warning level was applied. Not only the elderly or the sick are considered to be at risk, but everyone. The authorities called on people to drink enough, to stay in refrigerated rooms or in the shade. In some places, the heat is said to last until Monday.
Power grid operators saw the energy supply in danger. On the one hand because people let their air conditioning systems run harder in the heat and on the other hand because forest fires threatened to interrupt power lines. In California, Governor Gavin Newsom allowed marine engines to be used to generate additional electricity.
It was only at the beginning of the month that a heat wave hit the northwest of the USA and western Canada with temperatures of almost 50 degrees. According to the US climate agency NOAA, last month was the hottest June in the country since records began 127 years ago, with an average temperature of 22.6 degrees Celsius.