California Rain and Snow in November Could End Fire Season
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Whatsapp Firefighting efforts in the U.S. are already being affected by drought in California.
(Source: AP/File)
California Governor Jerry Brown has declared a state of emergency in fire-threatening parts of the state, but his declared state of emergency may not be enough to relieve the pressures that have been building on the state’s firefighting resources.
The governor declared a state of emergency in the northern and central parts of the state, but he is expected to scale back his declaration in the southern and western portions of the state.
California has more than 20,000 active firefighters and 20 helicopters. There is a shortage of firefighting resources in the state, and the number of helicopters in the state has been reduced because a federal order to buy the helicopters has not been forthcoming.
“When you scale back because of a federal law, you scale back,” said Mark Ghilarducci, the director of the University of South Florida’s Urban and Regional Planning Center.
In recent years, fires, floods and other natural disasters have severely impacted California’s climate, increasing the likelihood of a fire season that could bring catastrophic loss to California residents and agriculture.
As the region has become poorer and more vulnerable to dangerous wildfire conditions, the state has been forced to spend an increasingly greater portion of available resources fighting fires, said Ghilarducci, who has been studying fires in California for decades.
“The threat is real,” he said.
But while the risk of wildfires is increasing in California, the state has shown an ability to avoid them, he said.
California has been declared a state of emergency in just 20 of California’s 49 counties. That means that a state of emergency was declared in only 2 percent of the state.
“California has been fighting fires for almost 200 years, and that’s been