Rare January Wildfire Hits U.S. Forest

Firefighters surrounded a rare January wildfire Thursday that blackened 180 acres of brush and timber parched by the drought in the Mendocino National Forest.

“Having a fire in January is almost unheard of,” U.S. Forest Service spokesman Matt Mathes said.

“If we get back to a regular winter weather pattern, this will be just an unfortunate blip on the screen. But there’s no question that if we do not start getting a lot of rain we’re in for a very, very dangerous fire season,” he said.

The fire came near the end of a near-rainless January, normally the wettest month of the year in the northern part of the state.

The blaze broke out Monday in Glenn County about 40 miles northwest of Willows on land owned by Louisiana-Pacific Corp. It started while the logging company was burning debris, Forest Service spokeswoman Phebe Brown said.

“The wind caught it and fed the flames,” she said. “We have extremely dry conditions because of the drought. We’re seeing in January what we would normally expect to see in August.”

Nearly 500 firefighters from the U.S. Forest Service, California Department of Forestry and inmates from the state Department of Corrections contained the flames shortly before dawn.