A devastating brush fire barreled into the city of Redding, Calif., on Thursday night, killing one person and destroying numerous structures as residents ran for their lives.
The Carr fire destroyed an untold number of homes in Shasta County, hopscotching into subdivisions Thursday night and Friday morning. Officials said hundreds of homes were threatened.
It was a chaotic scene across Redding, a city of 90,000 people, as towering flames whipped along the horizon and evacuation orders expanded by the hour.
Residents had little warning before the flames moved in. Officials said some civilians and firefighters were injured but provided few details.
"This fire is extremely dangerous and moving with no regard for what's in its path," said Incident Cmdr. Bret Gouvea with the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.
Mercy Medical Center said it was evacuating babies from its neonatal intensive care unit but that the facility was still fully functioning as of 11 p.m. Thursday
A local television station, KRCR News, cut off its live coverage so that anchors and other employees could evacuate the studio.
"The fire is extremely active tonight," said Cal Fire Capt. John Clingingsmith Jr.
Residents also reported sporadic power outages, including at the Redding Record-Searchlight newspaper, as well as jammed traffic as people evacuated from the fire zone.
"It's crazy. It's out of control," said California Highway Patrol Sgt. Tim Hinkson in a Facebook video as he evacuated residents Thursday.
A private bulldozer operator, who was not named, was killed late Thursday as the fire grew to more than 28,763 acres, jumping the Sacramento River and roaring toward Redding. It was the second firefighting death in California in recent weeks. Braden Varney, a bulldozer operator with Cal Fire, died fighting the Ferguson fire near Yosemite.
"As we mourn the loss, we also battle a fire that is moving extremely quickly and erratically into western Redding," Gouvea said, adding that other firefighters and civilians have been injured.
The devastation in Redding caps a grim period of fire in California. Last fall, Northern California's wine country was hit by the most destructive fires in state history, destroying thousands of homes and killing dozens of residents. Then in December, the Thomas fire tore through Ventura and Santa Barbara counties, becoming the largest single fire in state history.
Officials said there was little firefighters could do as the Carr fire swept into Redding amid triple-digit temperatures and strong winds.
"Structures are burning," Scott McLean, spokesman for the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, told the Sacramento Bee late Thursday. "The fire is moving so fast that law enforcement is doing evacuations as fast as we can. There have been some injuries to civilians and firefighters."
An evacuation center at Shasta High School was closed and a new one was opened at Shasta College. Additional centers were opened at Weaverville Elementary School in Weaverville, and Cross Point Community Church in Redding.
Rolling Hills Casino, located south of Redding in Corning, said on Facebook that it had opened its facilities to people displaced by the fire, as well as their pets.
Firefighting efforts were hampered Thursday by extreme fire behavior, dry weather and the high temperatures. It's unclear if the destroyed structures were homes, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. Five other structures were damaged.
Crews scrambled when a shift in the winds pushed the Carr fire three miles east in four hours, catching residents in Whiskeytown on their heels. The fire, which broke out Monday afternoon, was only 6 percent contained by Thursday night.
The blaze reached the edge of Whiskeytown Lake, where local news outlets reported that 40 boats were burned along with a number of homes.
Authorities placed 192 homes under mandatory evacuation orders, most of those in Whiskeytown and the community of French Gulch, Cal Fire said.
The blaze has been running along the north side of Highway 299 since a vehicle malfunction sparked it. More than 1,700 firefighters were battling the blaze.
The Carr fire was the most destructive of several major blazes burning around the state. In Riverside County, the Cranston fire burned 7,500 acres and 5 percent contained, easily spotted by the billowy plumes of smoke expanding into the sky. At least five homes were lost.
And near Yosemite, the Ferguson fire continued to burn in wilderness area.
