Two bodies were found inside a burned-out car in the path of a huge wildfire raging near California’s border with Oregon, authorities said on Monday.
The two were found Sunday morning on a residential driveway along Doggett Creek Road near Highway 96, the Siskiyou County Sheriff’s Office posted Monday morning on Facebook.
Officials have not released any further information on the two people found.
The McKinney fire, which started on Friday afternoon in the Klamath National Forest near the California-Oregon border – has since then ripped through 55,493 acres, according to Cal Fire Monday morning, making it the largest fire in the state this year.
The fire is still not contained and has forced at least 2,000 residents to evacuate while destroying homes and critical infrastructure, mostly in Siskiyou County, reports Reuters.
There are two other fires in the county that have forced at least 200 residents out of their homes. Those fires grew to more than 1,700 acres combined as of Sunday, the U.S. Forest Service said.
Heavy smoke over the fire helped slow its growth Sunday, but also kept firefighting aircraft grounded, the US Forest Service said in a Sunday night update, reports CNN News.
More than two decades of drought and rising temperatures, exacerbated by climate change, have made California more vulnerable than ever to wildfires. The two most devastating years on record were 2020 and 2021 based on the number of acres burned.
