While everyone has been focused on the elections (and rightfully so) there have been some significant wildfires that are absolutely tearing through both Ventura County California and New Jersey. What has surprised me is how days later and as the tales of these fires come out no one is talking about them at all.
In California the "Mountain Fire" in Ventura County just north of LA started on election day, November 6th, and as of CaliFire's last report is only 17% contained. This fire absolutely exploded in size having burned over 20,500 acres. It has moved so fast that people are barely able to get out as soon as they are getting evacuation orders.
A Ventura County Sheriff’s deputy recounted a daring rescue during the fire, saving patients from a Camarillo Heights care facility. The deputy, along with other responders, evacuated the patients with only their clothes on their backs as their home burned to the ground.
The fire and smoke have even gotten to the point where helicopters had to be grounded for rescue. With winds between 50 and 60 mph, embers are being thrown over 2 and a half miles beyond the fire line creating a huge issue for firefighters. Over 10,000 people have been ordered to evacuate now and warnings have gone out to others to prepare to have to evacuate if they can't get this fire under control.
Thankfully there do not seem to be any reports of missing or dead people from this fire and hopefully, this does not change. Over 130 structures have been completely destroyed, most of them being houses, and 88 more have been damaged. With 2,420 personnel working to control the fire armed with 378 engines and 14 helicopters if the wind continues to subside like it was doing on Friday night firefighters have a chance to make substantial progress.
That isn't the only wildfire issue though as New Jersey currently has four sizeable blazes that they are battling. For now, these four blazes seem to be isolated and for the most part away from both people and structures. While one fire has been mostly contained it first burned 360 acres and there has since been another one that as of two hours ago has grown to 100 acres and is 0% contained.
These fires while not the size and scale of the California fires we have seen are going to be causing issues for residents in NYC for the next few days especially if the Cannonball 3 wildfire continues to not be contained in any way shape or manner. Images of the various fires are pretty wild as you can see
Hopefully, we can see these fires get contained without too much loss of property for those involved.