wildfires

Bad air quality returns to much of the Northeast as smoke from Canadian wildfires wafts back over the region

Crews are battling a 120 acre wildfire in Bass River State Forest - Road closures and evacuations ordered

State fire officials are reminding residents that as coronavirus-related restrictions begin to be lifted and more people finally venture outside, it is people who are responsible for 99% of all fire starts.

ENTIAT, Wash. (AP) -- Several hundred firefighters worked Friday to contain a fire that has burned grass and brush across nearly 32 square miles in central Washington.

Officials said that possible rain forecast this week in Alaska could help crews gain control over a massive wind-whipped wildfire that forced dozens of people to flee to shelters and move some of their animals to safety at rodeo grounds.

More crews are being sent to northern Arizona to battle a wind-whipped 450-acre wildfire near Slide Rock State Park in scenic Oak Creek Canyon.

Firefighters scoured charred hillsides north of San Diego on Saturday to guard against a resurgence of flames that ripped through the region, while the last of tens of thousands of evacuees prepared to return home. For those battling a series of blazes for days, the relief was mixed with a sense of dread that drought-sapped vegetation, high temperatures and low humidity portend a long fire season

Calmer winds helped firefighters gain ground Saturday against fires that have destroyed homes and raced through nearly 20,000 acres of northern and eastern San Diego County brush land, while authorities have charged a man for adding fuel to one of the nearly dozen blazes.

More than 72,600 wildfires are reported in the U.S. each year and humans are the primary cause, starting roughly six times more blazes than lightning strikes in a given year, according to the National Interagency Fire Center in Boise, Idaho, which tracked fire causes between 2001 and 2013.

Officials say hundreds of new evacuation orders have been issued for the Southern California city of San Marcos where a wildfire continues burning out of control.