On infrared satellite maps, the August Complex fire burning in some of the most remote forests of Northern California shows up as an advancing serpentine, moving west in the mountains east of the Central Valley and along a front that now stretches almost 100 miles from north to south.
The largest wildland blaze in California history, the 877,477-acre fire complex stretches across five counties and has scorched areas rich with wildlife ― in the Mendocino National Forest, the Yolla Bolly-Middle Eel Wilderness, the Shasta-Trinity National Forest and Six Rivers National Forest.
The inferno’s official size jumped by about 300,000 acres late last week after officials folded in other large fires that had merged in the region.
And now its nearly unrestrained push west puts it on a path out of the wilderness and into the heart of California’s rugged and famed Emerald Triangle marijuana region at the most active and perilous time ― the run-up to the cannabis harvest.
“There are thousands of folks that migrate into Mendocino, Humboldt and Trinity counties every year, and they are not familiar with the territory let alone a massive wildland fire knocking at their door,” said state Sen. Mike McGuire, who represents the North Coast.
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