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      Lightning Is Blamed for Deadly New Mexico Fire

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      The South Fork fire and another one in the state left two people dead and destroyed 1,400 structures.Lightning sparked the larger of the two wildfires that have scorched southern New Mexico, leaving at least two people dead, destroying 1,400 structures and ravaging more than 25,000 acres, the authorities said on Wednesday.The blaze, known as the South Fork fire, began June 17 amid sweltering temperatures and was 87 percent contained on Wednesday evening, the Bureau of Indian Affairs said in a news release.“The identification of the point of origin and all evidence and data support lightning as the cause of the fire,” the agency said in a statement. “Human activity and factors did not contribute to the cause.”On June 23, the F.B.I. said that it was offering a reward of up to $10,000 for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the “person or persons responsible for starting” the South Fork fire and the Salt fire, the other major fire in New Mexico.On Wednesday, the bureau said that the Salt fire, which the authorities said was 84 percent contained, remained under investigation.The F.B.I. also said that it was still offering the reward for information “leading to the arrest and conviction of the person or persons responsible for starting the Salt fire.”Both fires broke out on June 17, burning across the Mescalero Apache tribal area, on U.S. Forest Service land and in areas around Ruidoso. The fires forced thousands of people to temporarily evacuate the village of Ruidoso and surrounding areas.According to the Western Fire Chiefs Association, the majority of wildfires in the U.S. are caused by people. Lightning is the most common natural cause, the organization said. More

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      13,000 Are Ordered to Evacuate as Wildfire Spreads in Northern California

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      A wildfire that began in Butte County, Calif., on Tuesday morning has burned more than 3,000 acres and threatened residents of the city of Oroville.The authorities in Northern California ordered about 13,000 people in Butte County to evacuate on Tuesday night as a wildfire spread, burning more than 3,000 acres as of Wednesday morning.California’s firefighting agency, Cal Fire, said that the fire began on Tuesday morning and that its cause was under investigation. It was not clear how many structures had been damaged by the blaze, called the Thompson fire, but photos showed several homes and vehicles engulfed in flames. No fatalities had been reported as of Wednesday morning.Sheriff Kory Honea of Butte County said at a news conference on Tuesday night that about 13,000 people had been ordered to evacuate. Many of the evacuation orders affected the city of Oroville, Calif., which is about 68 miles north of Sacramento and has a population of about 20,000 people.Track Wildfires in the U.S.See where wildfires are currently burning.The fire risk in Northern California has been made worse this week by low humidity and gusty winds, which can cause fires to rapidly spread. Red flag fire warnings, meaning that the risk for wildfires is heightened by weather conditions, were in place in more than a dozen counties on Tuesday and Wednesday.There is also a dangerous heat wave in Northern California, with temperatures on Wednesday expected to reach 110 and higher in cities including Sacramento, Chico and Redding. The National Weather Service issued an excessive heat warning that affects most of Northern California, including Oroville.Butte County was the site of the deadliest and most destructive wildfire in the state’s history. The Camp fire in 2018 killed at least 85 people and destroyed more than 90 percent of the homes in Paradise, a small town about 20 miles north of Oroville.Last week, residents of the nearby town of Palermo were ordered to evacuate because of the Apache fire, which burned 691 acres and has been contained. More

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      F.B.I. Offers Reward for Information About New Mexico Wildfires

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      The agency said it was offering up to $10,000 for information that leads to the arrest and conviction of those “responsible for starting the fires.”The Federal Bureau of Investigation is offering an award for information about two wildfires in southern New Mexico that left two people dead, prompted the evacuation of thousands and scorched more than 24,000 acres.The agency is offering up to $10,000 for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the “person or persons responsible for starting the fires” near the village of Ruidoso, N.M, the agency said in a statement.The F.B.I. asked for the public’s help in identifying what sparked the blazes.Margot Cravens, a spokeswoman for the F.B.I.’s field office in Albuquerque, declined to comment on Sunday evening but confirmed that the agency was assisting with the investigation.The South Fork and Salt fires began on June 17 amid sweltering temperatures and were still burning on Sunday evening. Extreme temperatures, low humidity and heavy rain in the area have complicated efforts to extinguish the fires, which are burning in the Mescalero Apache tribal area, on U.S. Forest Service land and in areas around Ruidoso.The South Fork fire, the larger of the two wildfires, has burned more than 17,000 acres and was only 31 percent contained on Sunday, according to New Mexico Fire Information, a website run by federal and state agencies.The Salt fire has burned more than 7,000 acres of tribal land in mostly inaccessible mountain terrain and remains only 7 percent contained, the authorities said.The two people who died were found on Tuesday in or near Ruidoso, according to the New Mexico State Police. One of them, a 60-year-old man, was found with burns on the side of a road near a motel, the police said. The other victim was found in the driver seat of a burned vehicle on a road.About 1,400 structures have been destroyed, and about 8,000 people from Ruidoso and the surrounding areas were forced to evacuate, the authorities said.Ruidoso announced it would be lifting evacuation orders for full-time residents, permitting them to return beginning 8 a.m. Monday. Some homes may be without gas, water and electricity, and air quality may be poor because of smoke and ash, according to a statement on the village’s website. Residents are being advised to bring a week’s worth of groceries and water.Some areas will remain off-limits because they are considered crime scenes and are “undergoing recovery efforts,” the statement said.Reporting was contributed by More

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      Wildfire Near San Francisco Prompts Evacuations and Highway Shutdown

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      The blaze, the Corral Fire, began Saturday afternoon, has burned more than 12,000 acres and was only 13 percent contained early Sunday.A fast-spreading wildfire east of San Francisco has burned through more than 12,000 acres, shut down major highways and prompted evacuation orders for nearby residents, according to public safety alerts and Cal Fire, California’s firefighting agency.The blaze, named the Corral Fire, began Saturday afternoon outside Tracy, Calif., and was only 13 percent contained early Sunday, Cal Fire said.The fire is the largest so far in this year’s California wildfire season, which typically runs from April to October. After an unusually wet winter that included heavy snowfall and significant rainfall, experts expect the spring and summer seasons to stay relatively mild.Still, California fire officials warned last week that an abundance of dry grass in the San Francisco and Modesto areas was creating a greater fire hazard as summer neared. Residents were prohibited from burning anything on their own properties, and fire officials for the Santa Clara area announced that all burn permits in their region would be suspended beginning Monday.Smoke from the Corral blaze, which was reported to have started as a grass fire, closed down parts of Interstate 580 beginning late Saturday, and an evacuation order was issued for nearby communities. Two firefighters were reportedly injured while battling the blaze. Their injuries were not life threatening, a local fire official told CNN.“Praying for our Tracy neighbors and first responders,” Mayor Kevin J. Lincoln of nearby Stockton posted on social media. Stockton fire departments were helping cover firehouse shifts while local brigades were dispatched to the Corral fire.The fire began near a test site for the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. The cause of the fire remains under investigation. More

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      Power Shut Off to 55,000 Colorado Customers to Prevent Wildfires Amid High Winds

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      Xcel Energy said the outage would affect parts of six counties and last until at least noon on Sunday. Winds could reach 100 miles per hour.A power company in Colorado announced on Saturday that it was cutting power to roughly 55,000 customers over wildfire concerns as powerful winds, some as high as 100 miles per hour, battered the state.The company, Xcel Energy, said in a statement that it “made the decision to proactively de-energize lines,” which would affect customers primarily in Boulder County and small parts of Broomfield, Douglas, Gilpin, Jefferson and Larimer counties.The shut-off was expected to start at 3 p.m. local time and last until at least noon on Sunday. The company said that “outages are likely to persist beyond that time frame because crews must physically inspect the power lines.”“Temporarily shutting power off is intended to prevent our electric system from becoming the source of a wildfire ignition,” the company said.The National Weather Service in Boulder, Colo., said on social media that winds are expected to increase through the afternoon and evening, with the strongest winds coming between 6 p.m. Saturday and 6 a.m. on Sunday.Areas in and near the foothills are expected to experience gusts from 80 to 100 m.p.h. Other areas could experience gusts of 55 to 70 m.p.h.The Storm Prediction Center warned that the “potential for rapid spread of any new fires that develop” was high, and that “extremely critical fire weather is expected across portions of southeast Colorado into the Oklahoma Panhandle and southwestern Kansas.”Parts of five states, including Colorado, Oklahoma and Texas, were under fire danger alerts, the center said.More than 77,000 people were in an area deemed “extreme,” the highest fire risk, while more than 2.9 million people were in areas deemed “critical.”A part of Interstate 70 was shut down in Kansas because of high winds, low visibility and crashes that were blocking the highway, the state’s Department of Transportation said on social media.Power failures, broken tree limbs and blowing dust are all expected because of the winds, forecasters said.People in areas affected by the high winds should “avoid any activity that may produce a spark,” and they should remain indoors if possible, the National Weather Service said.Xcel Energy said that “turning off customers’ power is not something we take lightly,” noting that it is “a last-resort step that can prove to be a lifesaving measure.”“Customers who use medical equipment that relies on electrical service should take steps to prepare for extended outages,” the company said.The South Metro Fire Rescue, which serves approximately 300 square miles of the south metro Denver area, said those who depend on oxygen tanks “should be prepared with enough spare bottles to last through Sunday, or consider staying with family, friends or in a hotel outside of the planned outage area.”It also advised against using outdoor stoves indoors for heating or cooking.“If using a generator, keep it outside in a well-ventilated area away from windows,” it said. More

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      Chile Wildfires Prompt Evacuations Along Coast

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      Several communities in the Valparaíso region were being evacuated on Wednesday night. Fires along the coast killed more than 100 people last month.The authorities were battling another round of dangerous wildfires along Chile’s Pacific coast on Wednesday night, several weeks after blazes there killed more than 100 people.Chile’s national disaster agency said on Wednesday night that several communities in the Valparaíso region were being evacuated as emergency crews battled the Cerro Cordillera fire. That part of the coast is dotted with towns that rise steeply from the ocean.Devastating wildfires swept through the region last month after erupting in Viña del Mar, a coastal resort city about 80 miles by road northwest of Santiago, the capital. They ravaged entire neighborhoods, trapped people fleeing in cars and destroyed thousands of homes. President Gabriel Boric called it Chile’s worst disaster since a cataclysmic 2010 earthquake killed more than 400 people and displaced about 1.5 million more.This is a developing story. More

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      What Are the Largest Wildfires in U.S. History?

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      The Smokehouse Creek fire in the Texas Panhandle is now one of the largest fires the country has faced. Here are five of the others.Fueled by dry grass, harsh winds and unseasonably warm temperatures, the Smokehouse Creek fire in the Texas Panhandle has now burned more than 1.1 million acres, making it the largest fire in the state’s recorded history.At more than a million acres burned, it is also one of the largest wildfires recorded in the United States.Almost all of the largest wildfires in U.S. history, including the Texas fire, are in fact not one fire with a single point of ignition but a combination of fires burning close together. They are what are known as fire complexes and are attacked by firefighters under a unified command.Here is a look back at five of the largest wildfires ever recorded in the United States.2020 — Northern CaliforniaAugust Complex FireThe largest wildfire in California’s recorded history was a merger of nearly 40 fires, most started by lightning strikes during August in Mendocino County, a rural area about 90 miles north of San Francisco. It burned through 1,032,648 acres and caused the death of a firefighter. Overall, 2020 was a brutal year of wildfires in California, with the state experiencing about 10,000 separate fires. The wildfire season that year consumed 4.3 million acres and killed 33 people, according to scientists.2004 — ALASKATaylor Complex FireLightning also caused this group of fires in August, during a time of dry weather. It consumed about 1.3 million acres in a sparsely populated area of eastern Alaska near the border with Canada. It was part of a record fire season in Alaska that burned more than 6.5 million acres. No deaths were reported.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Dozens Dead in Chilean Wildfires

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      The death toll is expected to rise as hundreds have been reported missing in the blazes near the cities of Viña del Mar and Valparaíso, an area home to more than a million people.Forest fires ripping through central Chile’s coastal hills since Friday have killed at least 51 people and destroyed more than 1,000 homes, with many more feared dead, according to the national government.The wildfires are encroaching on Viña del Mar and Valparaíso, two cities that form a sprawling region that is home to more than one million people on Chile’s central coastline, about 75 miles northeast of the capital, Santiago.Just after midday, President Gabriel Boric flew over the area in a helicopter and said his government had worked to “secure the greatest resources” in Chile’s history to fight the blazes during the country’s wildfire season, which typically hits during the Southern Hemisphere’s summer and reaches a peak in February.“I assure you all that we will be there as a government to help you recover,” he wrote on the social media platform X. On Friday night, President Boric issued a constitutional decree granting his government additional powers to combat the fires.The Chilean wildfires come as Colombia has also been battling blazes in the mountains around Bogotá, the capital, as dozens of other blazes have burned across the country, in what officials say is the hottest January there in three decades. Climatologists have linked the extreme dryness there and wildfires to warming trends afflicting South America.Various Chilean agencies, as well as the country’s air force, have deployed 92 planes to fly over the fires dropping water. The government has also issued a steady trickle of evacuation notices, mixed with pleas for calm.A firefighting helicopter over the hills near Valparaíso, Chile, on Saturday.Javier Torres/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesMakeshift refuges and support centers have sprung up in several towns, with local authorities calling for donations of drinking water, mattresses, blankets and food.The interior ministry imposed a 9 p.m. Saturday curfew in Viña del Mar as well as in several nearby towns.On Saturday morning, Chile’s interior minister, Carolina Tohá, said that a 17-year-old girl was among those killed.Ms. Tohá warned that the death toll was likely to rise once authorities gained access to the affected areas. She added that 92 fires were still burning nationwide — 29 of which are still being fought and 40 of which have been brought under control — with more than 160 square miles of land already having been ravaged by the fires.The mayor of Viña del Mar, Macarena Ripamonti, said that in addition to the confirmed fatalities, 249 people had been reported missing.Eight areas of the city have been evacuated, including patients from a hospital.This January was the second hottest on record in Santiago; the hottest was in 2017, a year also affected by the El Niño weather phenomenon, which typically brings high temperatures and heavy rainfall to the Pacific Coast of South America.While wildfires afflict central and southern Chile each summer, the regional director of Chile’s national forestry commission for Valparaíso, Leonardo Moder, said that one of the fires appeared to have been started deliberately and was racing toward Viña del Mar.Valparaíso’s City Council has begun a criminal investigation, officials said. More