Southern California Fires

Credit: Jeff Schmaltz; MODIS team; NASA, Posted on: Thursday, 25 October 2007, 07:26 CDT Download full size image

A massive aerial assault and a break in harsh winds helped firefighters make their first major progress against Southern California's firestorm, raising evacuees' hopes of returning home for good. But flames were still drawing perilously toward thousands of homes.

This image of the fires burning in Southern California was captured at 1:45 p.m. Pacific Daylight Time on October 24, 2007 by the MODIS on the Terra satellite. The fires are marked in red and have large plumes of gray smoke rising from them.

Strong Santa Ana winds pushed the smoke westward over the Pacific. The fires are strung along the mountains from locations near Santa Clarita to Tijuana. According to news reports from the morning of October 24, nearly a million people had evacuated their homes as fires spread from the mountains and hills toward cities and towns near the coast.

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