Two bodies were found inside a charred vehicle Sunday in the driveway of a home near the remote Klamath River community, the Siskiyou County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement. The names of the victims and other details were not immediately released. The McKinney wildfire in Northern California near the state line with Oregon has exploded in size to nearly 87 square miles (225 square kilometers) after Friday’s eruption in the Klamath National Forest, fire officials said. It’s California’s largest wildfire of the year so far, and officials have yet to determine a cause. Gusty winds from a thunderstorm pushed the several hundred-acre blaze into a massive blaze, while lightning sparked several smaller fires nearby, including one near the community of Seiad Valley, fire officials said. On Monday, heavy rain helped dampen the blaze, but it still threatens structures after burning more than 100, from homes to greenhouses, fire and sheriff’s officials said. About 2,500 people remained under evacuation orders. “If you get an order, that means go. This fire behavior, as you will hear, is incredible. Don’t try to fight it. Don’t try to get stuck,” Siskiyou County Emergency Services Director Bryan Schenone said at a community meeting Monday afternoon. Windy and cloudy weather helped fire crews attack the blaze, and bulldozers were able to hit the town of Yreka, fire officials said. As of Monday, the fire was about 4 miles (6.4 kilometers) from the town of about 7,500 people. Valerie Linfoot’s son, a firefighter, called to tell her their family home of three decades on the Klamath River had burned down. Linfoot said her husband worked as a U.S. Forest Service firefighter for years, and the family did everything they could to prepare their home for a fire — including installing a metal roof and trimming trees and tall grass around the house. property. “It was as safe as we could get, and it was so dry and so hot and the fire was going so fast,” Linfoot told the Bay Area News Group. She said her neighbors have also lost homes. “It’s a beautiful place. And from what I’ve seen, it’s just decimated. It’s completely destroyed,” he told the news outlet. In northwestern Montana, winds prevailed Monday afternoon on a wildfire burning in forested land west of Flathead Lake, forcing firefighters to ground all aircraft and prompting the Lake County Sheriff’s Office to begin evacuating residents in the northeast corner of the fire. The fire was producing a lot of smoke, creating visibility problems for aircraft, said Sara Rouse, a spokeswoman for the fire management team. The fire, which started Friday afternoon near the town of Elmo on the Flathead Indian Reservation, has burned 20 square miles (52 square kilometers), fire officials said. Idaho’s Moose Fire has burned more than 85 square miles (220 square kilometers) in the Salmon-Challis National Forest while threatening homes, mining operations and fisheries near the town of Salmon. It was 23% contained on Monday. And a wildfire raging in northwest Nebraska prompted evacuations and damaged or destroyed several homes near the small town of Gering. The Carter Canyon Fire started Saturday as two separate fires that joined. It was about 30% contained by early Monday morning. In California, Gov. Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency on Saturday, allowing him more flexibility to make emergency and recovery decisions and tap into federal aid. Scientists said climate change has made the West hotter and drier over the past three decades and will continue to make weather more extreme and wildfires more frequent and destructive. The US Forest Service has closed a 110-mile (177-kilometer) section of the famed Pacific Crest Trail in northern California and southern Oregon. Sixty hikers in that area were helped away Saturday, according to the Jackson County Sheriff’s Office in Oregon, which assisted in the effort.
Weber reported from Los Angeles. Associated Press reporters Amy Hanson in Helena, Montana. Margery Beck in Omaha, Nebraska. and Keith Ridler in Boise, Idaho, contributed to this report.
