California braces itself for more lightning storms after wildfires kill 7
5951 Min Read
California braced for more lightning storms that could spark dozens of new blazes after over 600 wildfires in the last week burned an area three times the size of Los Angeles.
The worst of the wildfires, including the second and third largest in California history, were around the San Francisco Bay Area with roughly 240,000 people under mandatory evacuation orders or evacuation warnings in the state.
The National Weather Service on Monday morning lifted a warning for lightning and high winds in the area, giving firefighters some relief, but kept the “red flag” alert in place for much of Northern California.
“The threat of a thunderstorm over a fire area is dangerous, let alone over the second and third largest in California history,” Brice Bennett, a spokesman for the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection said of the two largest blazes, the LNU and SCU Lightning Complexes.
The fires, which were ignited by over 13,000 lightning strikes from dry thunderstorms across Northern and Central California since Aug. 15, have killed at least seven people and destroyed over 1,200 homes and other structures.
