Firefighters battling wildfires in California's wine country face the prospect of new outbreaks when dry, windy conditions return on Wednesday to an area where at least 17 people have been killed and 2,000 homes and businesses destroyed in blazes.
Some 155 people were still missing in Sonoma County, although 45 others had been found and some of those unaccounted for may be due to confusion surrounding evacuations.
Gusts of up to 80kph and 10% humidity are forecast for later on Wednesday and into Thursday for the region where 17 fires have forced 20,000 people to flee their homes, fire officials said. "The potential for new fires that could grow exponentially as these fires did in such a short time period is there," said Lynne Tolmachoff, spokeswoman for California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.
The weather gave firefighters a reprieve on Tuesday as cooler temperatures, lower winds and coastal fog allowed them to make headway against the fires that had burned 115,000 acres.
Some evacuations in Nevada and Yuba counties in western California were lifted on Tuesday while other evacuations to the east in Sonoma and Napa counties, where more than 50,000 acres burned, were expanded, Tolmachoff said.
The city of Santa Rosa was particularly hard hit by the so-called Tubbs Fire, which damaged a Hilton hotel and destroyed a mobile home park.
Napa Valley Vintners, a trade group, said it was too early to assess the economic impact of the fires. At least four wineries had suffered "total or very significant losses," and at least nine reported damage, the group said.
California Governor Jerry Brown declared a state of emergency in several northern counties where fires where burning and in Orange County in Southern California, where the so-called Canyon Fire 2 destroyed 14 structures and damaged 22 and forced the evacuation of 5,000 people, fire spokesman Thanh Nguyen said.
