While Southern California burns, governor declares fire devastation to be “new normal”
By
Brian Dixon and Dan Conway
12 December 2017
Fires continued to rage for an eighth straight day across Southern California on Monday. Though some of the relatively smaller fires in Northeast Los Angeles, Santa Clarita and West Los Angeles are now considered completely or nearly completed contained, larger fires in Ventura, San Diego and Riverside continue to burn.
Since they began last Monday, the fires have collectively destroyed more than 790 structures; 18,000 structures remain under threat according to official estimates.
One person is confirmed dead as a result of the fires while more than 45 horses and an uncounted number of livestock and other animal life have also perished.
The largest blaze, known as the Thomas fire, has burned over 230,000 acres across Santa Barbara and Ventura County. The total size of the fire now exceeds the combined area of the five boroughs of New York City and is nearly a third the size of the state of Rhode Island.
The Thomas fire spread 50,000 acres on Sunday alone, leading officials to order the evacuation of 5,000 residents in Santa Barbara County, while putting another 30,000 on alert. Containment of the fire has dropped from 15 to 10 percent. It is now the fifth largest wildfire in modern California history according to CalFire data.
The southern edge of the Thomas fire was contained by Sunday, but fire continues to fan out in other directions, including northwest along the Pacific coast where it threatens 13,000 residents of the nearby town of Carpinteria.
The town is surrounded by ocean to the south and the steep hillsides of the Los Padres National Forest to the north. Because the…