Shutterstock
Normally, September is a time to start looking ahead to the holiday season and planning out Christmas shopping. However, on the West Coast, LG TV rebates and Black Friday sales are the last thing on anyone’s mind. Instead, over 500,000 people in Oregon have evacuated, leaving their homes behind ahead of raging wildfires.
A wildfire that began after a California gender reveal party has burned thousands of acres of land across the West Coast.
Police vehicles rolled through Northwest Oregon communities on Friday, with loudspeakers blaring evacuation orders. People scrambled to grab pets and treasured belongings and tearfully left their homes behind.
The flames are cutting through a densely-populated region of the state, forcing historic numbers of people to evacuate to safer regions. The displaced account for over ten percent of Oregon’s population.
The chaos of these wildfires would be hard to bear in any circumstances. However, this year has been trying to people across the country. The COVID-19 pandemic still continues to threaten lives and sicken Americans across the country.
This makes evacuation fraught with concern: where will evacuees find shelter? A large movement of population is the opposite of what medical experts call for in containing the pandemic.
Meanwhile, inmates from nearby prisons have also been moved out of an abundance of caution. Elsewhere, two large fires are threatening to meet in the middle, leading to officials ordering local firefighters to temporarily disengage due to the danger.
The flames are growing hot enough to spark firestorms, localized twisters of flame caused when fires pull in more oxygen than the surrounding air can provide. These firestorms, in turn, fuel the flames to burn even hotter.
Officials in Oregon have taken steps to reassure the public who have left their homes behind. Law enforcement has been promised to be ramped up to curtail looting of abandoned homes and buildings. Fire officials have noted that they are trying to approach the flames from a tactical standpoint, choosing their battles before engaging.
The flames pose a serious threat due to the unusual weather conditions. The West Coast has seen unprecedented drought conditions recently, rendering nearby vegetation dry and easy to burn.
High wind speeds, coupled with lack of rainfall, has allowed the blazes to spread uninhibited through scarcely populated federal forests. Now, the flames are bringing life-threatening danger to millions of people in densely-populated areas of the West Coast.
