About half a million or ten percent of Oregon citizens had to evacuate the state on Friday due to the raging wildfires in the state. Authorities also advised residents of Portland to leave as intense wind-driven wildfires charred the U.S. West Coast states, which are responsible for at least 24 fatalities.
Around one hundred wildfires throughout the US have destroyed a region almost as big as the state of New Jersey West. As a result, it made pollution that gave California, Oregon, and Washington, the poorest air quality in the world.
Oregon suffered the brunt of the damage. Meanwhile, rescue teams are still struggling to reach places where fires spread through several small communities in the rocky mountains.
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Molalla, a town some 25 miles (40 km) south of downtown Portland, is now a ghost town. The over 9,000 residents of the town had to evacuate the town on the advice of authorities. However, the fire department announced that about 30% of the town still refused to leave.
The logging community was on the front line of a large evacuation area extending north to within three miles (4.8 km) of downtown Portland. In fact, the Clackamas County Police was on the ground at 10 p.m. PT (0500 on Saturday GMT) curfew to prevent “possible escalated violence.”
Wildfires send people out of their homes
Approximately 10% of the state population encountered a red “GO!” alert to leave home instantly. While hundreds of thousands more were under “BE SET” yellow cautions, to leave at a minutes notice, or “BE READY” green warnings.
As the winds fell and the humidity level increased on Friday. Therefore, the firefighters sent drones to the intense smog to investigate the fire.
“We don’t know where the fire is,” said Lt. Mike Penunuri, a Molalla Fire Department, staring into the smoke in the city center that whittled down visibility to one block.
