California braces for high winds that could propel deadly wildfires

September 17 ------ California faces more devastation from wildfires that have ravaged the West Coast, authorities warned Wednesday, with strong winds and dry heat expected to whip up flames from dozens of blazes raging across the state. Governor Gavin Newsom said although firefighters had made progress in their battle to contain more than two dozen major wildfires, so-called Santa Ana winds could fuel the relentless blazes.

“With wind events that we are experiencing currently and what we anticipate over the coming days, we have to be mindful that even with high containment numbers, those fires are anything but behind us,” he told a press briefing. Highlighting the scale of the unfolding catastrophe, Newsom said the state so far this year has experienced 7,606 fires as opposed to 4,972 in 2019. He said the flames have devoured nearly 2.3 million acres — 1.5 million of them since mid-August — as opposed to 118,000 last year.

“These numbers bear fruit to that assertion that this is historic,” he said. Newsom also appeared to hit out at US President Donald Trump, who visited the state earlier this week, saying he had “no patience for climate change deniers” who reject mounting scientific evidence that extreme weather events are linked to global warming.

Trump during his visit downplayed climate concerns over the wildfires, saying that global warming will reverse on its own. “The scale and magnitude of these fires are at a level much higher than any of the 18 years that our monitoring data covers” since 2003, said Mark Parrington, senior scientist and wildfire expert at Europe’s Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS). He added that the fires are emitting so much pollution that thick smoke was visible over 8,000 kilometers (4,900 miles) away in northern Europe, underscoring the devastation of the blazes.

The heaviest smoke from the fires remains over the US West Coast, with cities like Los Angeles and San Francisco registering some of the worst air quality in the world.

Source: mb.com.ph