Wildfires Decimating California and Nevada Lead to Evacuations, Loss of Power

A dangerous mixture of dry conditions and wind are leading to serious wildfires in California and Nevada.

Firefighters clean burned trees and branches as the Line Fire grows on Sept. 8 in San Bernardino, Calif. / Mandatory Credit - Qian Weizhong / VCG via Getty Images

Firefighters in the Western part of the United States have been dealing with a lot of challenges in 2024. They are facing one of their biggest currently in California and Nevada.

On Tuesday, strong winds and dry conditions mixed with a heat wave led to the rapid spread of wildfires across California. Temperatures went over 100 degrees in Los Angeles, making things even more difficult for first responders to deal with.

The Line Fire, which started last week in San Bernardino County, has continued ravaging the area. At least 65,000 structures are thought to be in danger as nearly 33,000 acres have been burned.

Containment for the Line Fire is now thought to be at 14 percent as people are doing everything in their power to slow things down. The fires are so strong that they create pyrocumulus clouds. 

These clouds developed because when fires get too intense they are capable of creating their own weather patterns. According to the National Weather Service, at least 280 lightning strikes hit the ground from those pyrocumulus clouds.

Pyrocumulus clouds may form on top of very hot fires, like today for the Line Fire near Highland, CA. These can create very dangerous conditions for fire fighters! As of 630PM, we recorded over 3700 lightning strikes inside the clouds, with over 280 ground strikes! #cawx @NWS https://t.co/EorjHIhRBw

— NWS San Diego (@NWSSanDiego) September 8, 2024

The Airport Fire in Orange County and the Bridge Fire in Angeles National Forest have also reported sightings of pyrocumulus clouds, as shared by Marlene Lenthang, Evan Bush and Phil Helsel of NBC News.

Red flag warnings were issued in Southern California. A red flag warning is something shared by the NWS to spread the word that conditions are ideal for wildland fire combustion and to spread quickly.

The same warnings were issued throughout a large portion of Nevada as well. Just south of Reno, the Davis Fire was blazing with zero percent containment in a Tuesday update with 5,600 acres already destroyed.

Somewhere between 12,000-14,000 people have already been evacuated because of the wildfire that started on Saturday. 14 structures have already been impacted by the flames as well.

Luckily for the most impacted areas in southern California and Nevada, a cold front is expected to hit on Wednesday. That should help the slowing of these wildfires in most cases.

But, there is still concern that the increased winds could worsen things in Nevada.

In 2024, nearly 7 million acres of land have been destroyed by wildfires, which is more than double what was ruined in 2023. More than 24,000 fire personnel were out attempting to corral these latest disasters.