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THE DEATH TOLL from California’s wildfires rose to 33 last night as firefighters made some progress in containing the infernos but said intensifying winds were a concern.
“We’re not out of this emergency, not even close,” said Mark Ghilarducci, director of the California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services.
“But we are seeing some progress in areas the fires have impacted,” Ghilarducci told a news conference.
We’ll get ahead of these flames.
California fire chief Ken Pimlott said more than 9,000 firefighters were battling 17 large fires that have consumed a total of 221,754 acres (89,700 hectares) since Sunday.
An estimated 5,700 structures have been destroyed by the wildfires, up from 3,500 reported on Wednesday, CAL FIRE said on its Twitter account.
The death toll rose to 33 with a 14-year-old boy’s body reportedly being recovered in Mendocino county near his family’s home.
“It appears he was attempting to evacuate the area on foot when he was overtaken by the fire,” the Mendocino County Sheriff’s office told the Ukiah Daily Journal.
Sonoma County officials earlier Friday reported another death, which had brought the total to 32.
“We have had some significant progress,” Pimlott said.
“Three smaller fires have been contained,” he said, and “we’ve increased containment on some of the major fires.”
Pimlott said firefighting efforts could be complicated, however, by winds that were expected to increase overnight to more than 45 miles per hour (72 kilometers per hour).
Pimlott also said it could be weeks before investigators determine what caused the fires, the deadliest in California’s history.
The Griffith Park fire in Los Angeles County in 1933 killed at least 29 people, and 25 people died in the 1991 Oakland Hills fire.
Sonoma County Sheriff Rob Giordano said his department was continuing to track down people reported missing by family or friends.
The Sonoma County Sheriff’s Department had received 1,308 missing persons reports so far and 1,052 people have been located, Giordano said.
Evacuation orders remained in place meanwhile for several towns in California’s wine-producing Napa and Sonoma counties, where hundreds of people have already lost their homes to the fast-moving infernos.
More than 3,500 homes and businesses have been destroyed across the state.
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Take that Belgium you f*ckers.
Ha!
I can’t wait to get out of this kip, maybe go to a country where good news feels good, instead of this hole where good news is nothing more than propaganda for the sheepies
The grass is always greener…
I wouldn’t buy a used car off him. Everything is looking rosy, except we owe around 200 billion and are still borrowing about 9 billion a year. But if they still want to give it to us we’ll take it.
That’s not his comments or what his job is. His job is just to get the best loan rate and that’s what he’s commenting on.
So what is our debt to GDP ratio ? Irish Times today says it was 123.7 % at end 2013. Corrigan says it’s under 100% ?
It’s not his fault we owe 200BN. Remember “we all partied !!!”……..now if they get us to repeat it often enough………..
So what! Massive money printing and zero interest rates is forcing investors to invest in junk bonds like ours to get any sort of return coupled with Dragi saying he’d intervene if countries were close to default is pushing down interest rates. Greece’s bonds are also around 3.6% Ffs and they defaulted to the tune of 100bn! The fact of the matter is austerity and Keynesianism for the banks has increased debt and risk in the world economy, setting us up for a monster crash bigger than 2007! What will that mean for us? Confiscation of savings and destruction of pensions, further collapse in income and ever widening wealth and income gaps. Whupdedoo!
I think as a country we need to decide what the bottom is in terms of support. It seems we just can’t decide how far left we are trying to go. Until then people will always feel hard done by.
Hooray!!!
I don’t judge my economy on how good our bond yields are or how many new McJobs have been created. I judge it on how well the state cares for kids with special needs or how many homeless I see sleeping in doorways in Dublin’s business district every morning.
People matter more than interest on bonds.
have your say