On Tuesday, the number of towns in the vicinity of a wildfire in California that may have been started by fireworks or a BBQ on the Fourth of July and that is located in a hilly area that is a popular tourist attraction had their mandatory evacuation orders increased.
Monday afternoon saw the start of the Electra Fire in Sierra Nevada Gold Country, which quickly quadrupled in size to reach around 6.1 square miles (15.8 square kilometers). As on Tuesday night, it had only been contained 5 percent.
According to authorities with the fire department, the blaze was making rapid progress upward.
Gary Redman, the sheriff of Amador County, said that while the pace of spread is not as rapid as it was yesterday, the disease is nonetheless still spreading. He said that firemen were striving to keep the flames confined to portions of the canyon that did not have any inhabitants.
According to Redman, the combined effect of mandatory evacuation orders and warnings had an impact on up to 700 households in Amador County and between 300 and 400 persons in Calaveras County. Both humans and their pets were housed in the evacuation shelters that were set up.
Redman said that 85 to 100 individuals who were spending the holiday by a river were forced to seek refuge inside a building owned by Pacific Gas & Electric Co. since the fire erupted at a recreation area that was filled with people. Everyone was eventually rescued and brought to safety.
“This is the point in my life that I came the closest to being burned by a fire. Milka Mikula of Valley Springs, who was at the river with her husband, her 5-year-old daughter, and her 1-year-old son, reported that the bear was “literally within feet” of them.
According to what she said to KCRA-TV, they were forced to wait over six hours before they could finally begin their journey home.
“All I wanted was to get away from that place with my children. “For a good stretch of time, I was trembling very, extremely severely,” Mikula recalled.
According to Redman, the source of the fire is unknown, although it began near the Vox Beach region of the North Fork Mokelumne River. He said that this may imply that the source could be anything like fireworks or a BBQ.
According to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, more than one hundred fire engines, one thousand and two hundred firemen, and fourteen helicopters were sent to the fire because it posed a danger to the electricity grid. It was said that the terrain was quite steep and harsh.
An incident management team was created by Cal Fire in response to the fire. According to Cal Fire, the teams “give operational management and assistance to large-scale, growing situations” and “are made up of qualified employees who perform such services.”
According to Redman’s statements, the local fire protection department had one fireman who sustained burn injuries.
Vox Beach is located around 89 kilometres (55 miles) east of Sacramento, in the middle of the Sierra Nevada area, which is rich in the history of the Gold Rush that occurred in the middle of the 1800s.
There were a number of additional minor fires burning around the state.