17 Dead and Dozens Missing in Vast Western Wildfires

Oregon official warns of a ‘mass fatality incident.’

Dozens of people remain missing in Oregon as wildfires that have torched millions of acres of land across the West continue to burn, the death toll has risen to 17 and smoke was choking residents in cities far from the fires.

With the blazes still spreading and many homes destroyed, Oregon’s director of emergency management said the state feared a “mass fatality incident.”

Oregon, Washington and California are all under assault from a wildfire season of historic proportions, with the firefighting effort compounded by the coronavirus pandemic and misinformation online. Already, California has seen more than 2.2 million acres go up in flames, nearly nine times what burned in 2019, and officials warn that more fires are likely.

Gov. Gavin Newsom of California said on Friday that he feared more bodies would be found and described the scale of the battle firefighters were in as unprecedented. One of the fire complexes burning this week became the largest in the state’s history, and has now burned across 747,000 acres.