A fast-growing wildfire tearing through tinder-dry vegetation in the Sierra Nevada Range near the town of Foresthill grew another 1,100 acres overnight and continues to threaten multiple communities, important infrastructure and hundreds of homes, Cal Fire said Thursday morning.
The Mosquito Fire shows no signs of slowing down and by sunrise had already pumped out a massive smoke cloud that towered above Placer County, signaling extreme fire activity on the ground.
Cal Fire said “critical infrastructure” is threatened, including the Placer County Water Agency pump station and dam, Placer County Fire Repeater Site, 230 kV transmission lines, Sugar Pine Dam and community drinking water supply, Ralston hydroelectric powerhouse and cellular and microwave transmission towers.
Multiple reports and photos posted on social media Wednesday evening indicated that flames devoured some homes, structures and cars in Michigan Bluff, a historic Gold Rush town about seven miles east of Foresthill overlooking the North and Middle forks of the American River.
The fire started in the Tahoe National Forest at 6:27 p.m. on Sept. 6 near Oxbow Reservoir 3 miles east of Foresthill amid a record-breaking heat wave in California that sent temperatures soaring above 100 degrees for several days straight. Hundreds of people were forced to flee their homes and evacuations remain in place Thursday morning. (The live evacuation map is the best source for updated evacuation information.) The fire is burning through vegetation that was left parched and highly flammable after days of scorching weather. The acreage burned went from 5,705 acres on Wednesday night to 6,870 acres on Thursday morning.
Brent Wachter, a fire meteorologist at the U.S. Forest Service’s Geographic Coordination Center in Redding, said the extreme dryness of the landscape was evident in the overnight hours after the fire first broke out. Fires often calm down after sunset when winds subside and temperatures drop, but the Mosquito Fire continued to burn — and the same thing happened last night.
“That’s how flammable the fuels are. Fires are even growing actively overnight,” Wachter told SFGATE on Wednesday.
Smoke from the fire spread across the Sierra foothills and flooded the Lake Tahoe basin. Placer County’s health department issued an air quality advisory warning of unhealthy air through Sept. 9.
This is a developing story and details will be added as they become available.
People watch from a distance as the Mosquito Fire burns near Michigan Bluff in unincorporated Placer County, Calif. Wednesday, Sept. 7, 2022.
Stephen Lam/San Francisco Chronicle via AP
California’s Mosquito Fire ignited near Oxbow Reservoir 3 miles east of Foresthill on Sept. 6, 2022.
Cal Fire