Major blazes continued to wreak havoc across vast tracts of California, Oregon and Washington, covering much of the western United States in a thick blanket of smoke blocking out the sun and turning skies orange.
WASHINGTON
FIRES
On Sep. 9
Portland
Riverside fire
Lyons
A 12-year-old
boy and his
grandmother died
Beachie Creek fire
Thick smoke
Lionshead
fire
Detroit
Mostly destroyed
Vida
Town mostly
destroyed
OREGON
Ashland
At least one death
near the town
CALIFORNIA
August complex fires
Contributing a large amount
of smoke to the
surrounding area
Plume
of smoke
Bear fire
The remains of three
victims found
Sacramento
San Francisco
San Jose
Creek fire
Tore through the Sierra
National Forest destroying
over 360 homes and
other structures
Thick smoke
Dolan fire
Satellite image: MODIS/NASA
WASHINGTON
FIRES
Hotspots detected
on Sep. 9
Coastline shrouded
in smoke
Portland
Riverside fire
Salem
Lyons
A 12-year-old boy
and his grandmother
died according to
local news reports
Beachie Creek fire
Thick smoke
Lionshead fire
Detroit
Town mostly destroyed
Eugene
Holiday farm fire
Vida
Town mostly
destroyed
OREGON
Star Mountain and
Archie Creek fires
Crater Lake
National Park
Two Four Two fire
Medford
Ashland
Fire suspected of causing
at least one death near
the town
Almeda fire
Red Salmon
Complex fires
CALIFORNIA
Butte/Tehama/Glenn
Lightning Complex fires
Plume
of smoke
August complex fires
Contributing a large amount
of smoke to the
surrounding area
Bear fire
The remains of three
victims were found in two
separate locations.
Fire spread largely unchecked
over some 97,000 acres.
Sacramento
Images on social
media showed the
San Francisco
Bay Area under
darkened orange
and red skies
San Francisco
San Jose
Creek fire
Tore through the Sierra
National Forest destroying
over 360 homes and
other structures
Thick smoke
Dolan fire
Satellite image: MODIS/NASA
Tacoma
WASHINGTON
FIRES
Hotspots detected
on Sep. 9
Coastline shrouded
in smoke
Portland
Riverside fire
Salem
Lyons
A 12-year-old boy
and his grandmother
died according to
local news reports
Beachie Creek fire
Thick smoke
Lionshead fire
Detroit
Town mostly destroyed
Eugene
Holiday farm fire
Vida
Town mostly
destroyed
OREGON
Star Mountain and
Archie Creek fires
Crater Lake
National Park
Two Four Two fire
Medford
Ashland
Fire suspected of causing
at least one death near
the town
Almeda fire
Red Salmon
Complex fires
CALIFORNIA
Butte/Tehama/Glenn
Lightning Complex fires
Towering plume
of smoke
August complex fires
Contributing a large amount
of smoke to the
surrounding area
Bear fire
The remains of three
victims were found in two
separate locations.
Fire spread largely unchecked
over some 97,000 acres.
Sacramento
Images on social
media showed the
San Francisco
Bay Area under
darkened orange
and red skies
San Francisco
San Jose
Creek fire
Tore through the Sierra
National Forest destroying
over 360 homes and
other structures
Thick smoke
Dolan fire
Satellite image: MODIS/NASA
WASHINGTON
FIRES
On Sep. 9
Portland
Lyons
A 12-year-old
boy and his
grandmother died
Thick smoke
Detroit
Mostly destroyed
Vida
Town mostly
destroyed
OREGON
Ashland
At least one death
near the town
CALIFORNIA
August complex fires
Contributing a large amount
of smoke to the
surrounding area
Plume
of smoke
Bear fire
The remains of three
victims found
Sacramento
San Francisco
San Jose
Creek fire
Tore through the Sierra
National Forest destroying
over 360 homes and
other structures
Thick smoke
Dolan fire
Satellite image: MODIS/NASA
Tacoma
WASHINGTON
FIRES
Hotspots detected
on Sep. 9
Portland
Coastline shrouded
in smoke
Riverside fire
Salem
Lyons
A 12-year-old boy
and his grandmother
died according to
local news reports
Beachie Creek fire
Thick smoke
Lionshead fire
Detroit
Town mostly destroyed
Eugene
Holiday farm fire
Vida
Town mostly
destroyed
OREGON
Star Mountain and
Archie Creek fires
Crater Lake
National Park
Two Four Two fire
Medford
Ashland
Fire suspected of causing
at least one death near
the town
Almeda fire
Red Salmon
Complex fires
Butte/Tehama/Glenn
Lightning Complex fires
CALIFORNIA
Towering plume
of smoke
August complex fires
Contributing a large amount
of smoke to the
surrounding area
Bear fire
The remains of three
victims were found in two
separate locations.
Fire spread largely unchecked
over some 97,000 acres.
Sacramento
Images on social
media showed the
San Francisco
Bay Area under
darkened orange
and red skies
San Francisco
San Jose
Creek fire
Tore through the Sierra
National Forest destroying
over 360 homes and
other structures
Thick smoke
Dolan fire
Satellite image: MODIS/NASA
While more than two dozen major blazes continued to devastate California, the neighboring state of Oregon bore the latest brunt of wildfires plaguing much of the western United States over the past week.
An unprecedented spate of fierce, wind-driven wildfires in Oregon have all but destroyed five small towns, leaving a potentially high death toll in their wake, the governor said on Wednesday, as initial casualty reports began to surface.
A timelapse of satellite imagery taken Sep.9 - 9am - 8.00pm.
Infrared imagery showing burning fires on the same day.
Smoke from the fires also badly degraded air quality throughout the region, adding to health hazards already posed by the coronavirus pandemic.
Winds of up to 50 miles per hour (80 km per hour) sent flames racing tens of miles within hours, engulfing hundreds of homes as firefighters fought at least 35 large blazes in Oregon with a collective footprint nearly twice the size of New York City.
Several Oregon communities, including the town of Detroit in the Santiam Valley, as well as Blue River and Vida, and Phoenix and Talent in southern Oregon, were substantially destroyed, Governor Kate Brown told a news conference.
“This could be the greatest loss in human lives and property due to wildfire in our state’s history,” Brown said, without providing details.
Firefighters were forced to retreat from uncontrollable blazes while officials gave residents “go now” orders to evacuate in just minutes.
“It was like driving through hell,” Jody Evans told local television station NewsChannel21 after a midnight evacuation from Detroit, about 50 miles (80 km) east of Salem, Oregon’s capital.
Smoke from the fires darkened skies and made breathing difficult as far north as Canada and stretched down the coast to Southern California.
Residents in northern California’s Bay Area woke up to a doomsday-like skyline on Wednesday, as smoke from the state’s wildfires traveled into the upper atmosphere and blocked the sunlight, casting an orange glow across the region.
“It feels like the end of the world. It’s pretty scary,” said Beth Gleghorn, a 68-year-old Berkeley resident.
“It looks like doomsday,” added resident Carljuan Anderson, a 35-year-old Oakland resident.
Images from Oakland show dark, orange skies when it would usually be daylight.
Berkeley resident Tibisay Perez, a climate scientist at the University of California, Berkeley, said the orange sky was not unexpected.
“It’s amazing to see how air pollution is in our face when we have events such as biomass burning, wildfires that produce such a high density of air particles in the atmosphere that diffuses the light and this is what we’re seeing,” Perez said.
Corrections:
A previous version of this article incorrectly referred to the towns of Blue River and Vida being in Lane County. It also said Detroit was west of Salem, rather than east. Both facts have been corrected.
Sources:
Fire Information Resource Management System (FIRMS), NASA; Worldview, NASA. Satellite imagery used in timelapse videos from NOAA/RAMMB.
By Simon Scarr, Aditi Bhandari, Jitesh Chowdhury and Manas Sharma