(The Center Square) – A heat wave was underway Wednesday in Southern California, with inland areas reaching triple digits.
Closer to the coast and farther north, it was still hot, with highs hovering around 90, while crews fought fires.
The Madre Fire, which has burned 80,610 acres in rural San Luis Obispo County north of Santa Barbara, was 62% contained as of Wednesday afternoon. Temperatures ended up in the upper 80s to upper 90s across the fire with gusts between 25 to 30 mph, according to InciWeb, an interagency information system.
The Madre Fire broke out July 2 along State Route 166 and has been burning east-northeast onto the Carrizo Plain. The California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection is responding to the blaze in a unified command with Los Padres National forest and the Bureau of Land Management.
One structure was destroyed, and there was one injury to a firefighter, according to the Cal Fire’s website. Evacuation orders were in effect for 10 zones, and evacuation warnings have been issued for another five.
A total of 1,450 personnel has been deployed to fight the blaze, which was fueled by grass and dry brush and is California’s largest fire. Cal Fire said the response includes five helicopters, 35 water tenders, 82 engines and 16 bulldozers.
The state’s currently second largest fire is in Northern California’s Shasta County. Located north of the Pit River arm of Shasta Lake, the Green Fire had burned 3,847 acres as of Wednesday afternoon and was 0% contained, Cal Fire reported. The fire started July 1. Late Wednesday afternoon, the temperature there was 91 degrees, and highs approaching or slightly exceeding 100 degrees are expected on Thursday and Friday, according to the National Weather Service.
The state’s third largest fire is Butler Fire, which has burned 1,346 acres in Siskiyou County, on California’s border with Oregon. It was 88 degrees there late Wednesday afternoon, and the National Weather Service predicted a high near 89 on Thursday.
And southern Oregon has seen multiple fires because of lightning strikes. California Gov. Gavin Newsom announced the deployment of a Cal Fire team to assist firefighting efforts there.
In Southern California, the Wolf Fire in Riverside County was 95% contained after having burned 2,387 acres, according to Cal Fire.
Riverside and other Southern California counties are seeing plenty of heat this week, with the weather, as usual, cooler closer to the coast.
Los Angeles was expected to see a high near 89 Wednesday, according to the National Weather Service, with similar temperatures expected on Thursday. But inland, temperatures late Wednesday afternoon were 99 in in the inland Los Angeles County city of Lancaster (with a high near 103 expected on Thursday) and 100 in San Bernardino (with a high near 102 predicted for Thursday). Tourism hot spot Palm Springs saw 118 degrees late Wednesday afternoon, and a high of 114 was predicted for Thursday.
The coast was the place to cool off. San Diego got down to 73 degrees late Wednesday afternoon, and the high on Thursday was expected to be near 79, according to the weather service.
Much cooler was Northern California. Downtown San Francisco got down to 61 Wednesday afternoon, and Thursday’s high was projected to be near 72.
It’ll still be hot this weekend in Southern California, but local weather forecasters said temperatures will be closer to normal.
