Wildfires threaten San Francisco water suppler The Rim Fire, one of the largest in California history, continued to grow Sunday, spreading east and northeast on the edge of Yosemite National Park. The blaze had burned more than 133,000 acres since it was first reported Aug. 17 in Stanislaus National Forest, fire officials said. With the fire only 7 percent contained, firefighting efforts were focused on protecting threatened communities and Yosemite Valley, the most popular part of the national park.
Evacuation orders were in place for Tuolumne City and the area east of Highway 108 to Mi-Wok Village and for Highway 120 from the national park boundary west to Buck Meadows. Residents of Pine Mountain Lake, a gated resort community west of Yosemite, were allowed to return home late Saturday.
The fire is now the 15th largest in the history of the state, the Los Angeles Times reported. Fed by hot, dry and windy weather, it has doubled in size since Thursday.
InciWeb, a fire reporting service, said firefighters in some inaccessible areas are using a method known as indirect attack, where containment lines are set up away from the fire line.
While the Rim Fire was by far the largest, at least nine other wildfires were burning Sunday in California. They included the Corral Complex and Orleans Complex fires in Six Rivers National Forest, which have burned about 32,000 acres between them, and the 24,000-acre American fire in Tahoe National Forest.
Source: UPI