November 2008 California wildfires

2008 California wildfires
Some of the wildfires as seen from space during the height of the summer outbreak on July 9, 2008.
Statistics
Total fires	4,923
Total area	1,593,690 acres (6,449.4 km2)
Cost	Over $651.5 million (2008 USD)
Fatalities	32 (13 firefighters)
Non-fatal injuries	At least 92
Season
← 2007 2009 →

The 2008 California wildfire season was one of the most devastating since the turn of the 21st Century. While only 4,923 fires occurred, almost less than half as many as in 2007, the total area burned far exceeded that of previous years. Throughout the year, 1,593,690 acres (6,449.4 km²) of land was burned.

By July 5, 2008, 328 wildfires were burning, and those fires were only 81% contained. For the first time since 1977, the US military helped with ground-based firefighting, when Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger dispatched 400 California National Guard troops, including Chief Medical Officer Susan Pangelinan, to manage fire lines. He said the number of fires had stretched the state's fire-fighting resources thin. "One never has resources for 1,700 fires. Who has the resources for that?" Schwarzenegger said, adding, "Something is happening, clearly. There's more need for resources than ever before... it's fire season all year round."

Below is a list of all fires that exceeded 1,000 acres (400 ha) during the 2008 fire season. The list is taken from CAL FIRE's list of large fires.

The Summer 2008 fires were a concentrated outbreak of wildfires during the late spring and summer of 2008. Over 3,596 individual fires were burning at the height of the period, burning large portions of forests and chaparral in California, injuring at least 34 individuals and killing 32. The majority of the fires were started by lightning from dry thunderstorms on June 20, although some earlier fires ignited during mid-May. International aid from Greece, Cyprus, Chile, Argentina, Brazil, Australia, Canada, Mexico, and New Zealand helped fight the fires.

The first of the wildfires was the Big Horn Fire, which ignited on May 13. Three other minor wildfires ignited subsequently, but were extinguished by May 17. On May 20, the Avocado Fire ignited in Fresno County, only to be extinguished 2 days later. On May 22, 2008, the human-caused Summit Fire broke out in the Santa Cruz Mountains, which became the first major fire.

On July 5, 2008, California Governor Schwarzenegger commented that "I've been driving up and down the state of California going to all the various fires, and you can imagine, this state is very prepared for fire, but when you wake up one morning and have 500 fires across the state, it was a real shock to me... only to find the next morning there were 1,000 fires, and the next morning 1,400 fires, and then 1,700 fires igniting over 14 days."