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700 fires burning in California

2008-06-26 11:10

Berkeley - Hundreds of homes in the scenic community of Big Sur were threatened by a wildfire that already has burned 16 residences and was just 3% contained.

About 700 wildfires, many of them sparked by a severe electrical storm over the weekend, burned across much of the state, a point driven home for Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger as he travelled to central California to assess the damage there.

"I just took off with the plane down from Los Angeles and, literally from Los Angeles all the way up here, there was smoke, so you can see that there's fire everywhere," Schwarzenegger noted at a news conference on Wednesday in Monterey County.

Firefighters scrambled to tame the lightning-sparked wildfire in the Los Padres National Forest that has burned nearly 78 square kilometres near the coast about a mile south of Big Sur.

Difficult to stop

"Unfortunately, this fire is in an area that is going to be very difficult to stop, and expectations are there won't be any stopping this fire any time soon," said Mark Savage, a spokesperson for the US Forest Service.

The state's largest fire was about 30km east in a more remote area of the Los Padres forest. It also vexed firefighters, having scorched more than 238 square kilometres and destroyed two homes. The blaze, sparked by an escaped campfire on June 8, was about 71% contained.

Monterey sheriff's officials said mandatory evacuation orders were in place for both fires, but could not specify how many people were forced from their homes. The Monterey County fires have cost $33m to fight so far.

The governor also stopped on Wednesday in Butte County, where 27 lightning-sparked fires covering about 21 square kilometres were threatening 1 000 homes. The blazes, which were only 5% contained, cropped up just as the county was recovering from a fire that charred 74 homes and 93 square kilometres earlier this month.

Schwarzenegger announced on Wednesday that he allotted $20m in emergency funds to help Butte County fight fire.

- AP

inside news24

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