Images reveal huge scale of damage in Washington state after devastating wildfires
Images show piles of ash, melted cars and only blackened trees left standing.
Shocking images have revealed the vast scale of damage left behind by wildfires that raged through Washington state.
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Images show piles of ash, melted cars and only blackened trees left standing after three separate fires swept throught the state in the drought-stricken Pacific Northwest United States.
The blazes have destroyed over 700 houses and other buildings, forcing 64,000 people to evacuate in and around Spokane, the city hardest hit.
State officials said on Tuesday that more than 250,000 acres (101,171 hectares) are still burning across Washington state.
On Monday evening, a man was arrested on suspicion of deliberately starting one of the three fires in Spokane.
The suspect, 37-year-old Spokane resident Aaron Farinacci, was jailed on Monday on a $1 million bond on a count of first-degree arson, Spokane County Sheriff John Nowels said.
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Farinacci is accused of starting the Old Trails Fire, one of three that erupted on Saturday to the north and west of Spokane, by using matches or a lighter to ignite a roadside patch of grass, Nowels told reporters on Monday evening.
The origins of the two other fires remained under investigation, he said.
The three blazes together are ranked as the top firefighting priority in the US as a whole.
Dozens of major fires have scorched Washington and Oregon for weeks, fouling the air with smoke and soot.
Driven by gusting winds and tinder-dry conditions, the Spokane-area fires have blackened more than 10,000 acres (4,000 hectares) on the northern fringe of the state's second city, home to about 230,000 residents.
Authorities pleaded with people not to fly drones after dozens of such illegal flights grounded all firefighting aircraft on Monday.
"We're still in a firefight here," said Tom Stokesberry, spokesman for the firefighting teams in the area.
"This is just a dynamic situation with everything we're facing, three separate fires in the urban interface."
Cooler temperatures and lighter winds were expected to help firefighters on Tuesday.
But temperatures were set to rise into the 90s Fahrenheit (32 Celsius) starting midweek, making it harder to control the blazes which are not contained at all, state officials said in a report.
Scientists say the prolonged heat and droughts driving the growth in wildfires in North America, Europe and elsewhere in recent years are largely a function of manmade global warming, mostly caused by the use of fossil fuels.
No fatalities had been reported from the Spokane fires, but there is a high probability that will change as search and recovery expands into currently inaccessible areas, according to Benjamin Cossel of the incident command team.
President Donald Trump said on Sunday he would soon unveil his “punishment” for Canada over the wildfires that have raged through large area of the US in recent weeks.
The US leader has blamed Canada over an alleged mismanagement of its forests and previously warned it would be “held responsible” for the smoke that has moved south.
He renewed the threat over the weekend during a press huddle with reporters on Air Force One.
“On Canada, have you decided on a punishment yet for the wildfire smoke?” a reporter asked.
“I have, yeah,” Trump said, adding: “You’ll find out about it.”