California Wildfires have been growing for years. Taking lives and ravaging houses, these wildfires have primarily been because of the climate change in the state. Here’s a roundup of top 5 California wildfires. 

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Camp Fire (2018)

Ravaging the town of Paradise, November 2018 saw one of the deadliest wildfires in the history of California. The raging fire was caused by a 100-year-old electrical transmission line owned and operated by Pacific Gas and Electric. It continued to wreak havoc for 2 weeks and resulted in as many as 85 deaths, starting from Butt county. PG&E released a statement, reading, “PG&E disagrees with any suggestion that it knew of any specific maintenance conditions that caused the Camp Fire and nonetheless deferred work that would have addressed those conditions.”

Griffith Park (1933)

The Griffith Park fire in 1933 devastated Los Angeles, leading to 29 fatalities. Interestingly, despite spreading across mere 47 acres, it is still considered one of the most dangerous wildfires in California. Why? Workers in the park went into Mineral Wells Canyon to fight the fire, but a sudden change in the wind caused a brush fire into an inferno. Many untrained firefighters sadly lost their lives. 

Tunnel – Oakland Hills (1991)

Fire in the Oakland hills went on to burn 25 people along its devastating path in 1991. This was a result of rekindling from a small fire at 7151 Buckingham Boulevard on October 19. Firefighters responded quickly and thought they had brought the blaze under control. However, heat from the fire had caused pine needles to fall from the trees and cover the ground. While the firefighters thought they had extinguished the fire, the heat caused pine needles to fall on the ground and light up again. 

Tubbs (2017)

Tubbs fire had spread across 37,000 acres by the time it was contained, killing 22 people and destroying 5,600 buildings. The fire started from Santa Rosa and picked up enough speed to render it difficult to control. It was caused due to hot winds. 

North Complex (2020)

As the flames blazed through over 300,000 acres, the North Complex fire ravaged a historic schoolhouse and took over a camp for children with cancer. The flames killed 15 people. “There’s almost no statistic or dimension of this fire season 2020 in California that wasn’t astonishing or horrifying,” said Daniel Swain, surprised by the seriousness of California wildfires.