California's largest wildfire grows in size & intensity

(Associated Press) -- California’s largest active fire has exploded in size, growing rapidly amid bone-dry fuel and threatening thousands of homes as firefighters scramble to meet the danger.

The Park Fire’s intensity and rapid spread Friday evening led fire officials to make unwelcome comparisons to the monstrous Camp Fire, which burned out of control in nearby Paradise in 2018, killing 85 people and torching 11,000 homes.

More than 130 structures have been destroyed by this fire so far, and thousands more remain threatened.

Communities elsewhere in the U.S. West and Canada were under siege Friday, from a fast-moving blaze in rural Idaho to a new blaze that was causing evacuations in eastern Washington.