By: Aisha Dirie

With West Coast fires are at an all time high, and there is no doubt that climate change is to blame for these disasters. According to ‘Scientific American’, These fires have expanded across 1 million acres throughout the West Coast. Hundreds of people have lost their houses due to these fires, with California being a hotspot for COVID-19 currently, it’s not ideal. 

The causes for the fire is unknown but this has been happening for decades. There are some though that question whether climate change is to blame. “Jon Keeley, a senior scientist at the U.S. Geological Survey Western Ecological Research Center, argued that the study from Swain and others failed to show that hotter temperatures are driving wildfires.”

Although California has always been a hotspot of wildfires, it is not a surprise that these fires happen continuously, but this level of destruction has caused more people to wake up and look at the real life effects of climate change. 

With the wildfires, fire tornados have also erupted within those fires. Fire tornados happen when heat that is rising pulls in fire, dirt, ash, etc. and spirals into a tornado. “To have even one tornado within a fire is rare,” CNN meteorologist Taylor Ward said. These are rare, and with West Coast (specifically California) fires rising and continuing to damage homes, fire tornados are happening more frequently.

According to the Los Angeles Times, “The Creek Fire, which started on September 4, has burned 291,426 acres in the Sierra National Forest and remains just 34% contained.” This is one of the fires that started on the West Coast that left many people trapped in their homes. 

All along the West Coast, people were evacuating homes in response to the fires polluting the air. There is no doubt that these fires are getting worse, and we need to take action. If you look at the fires over the years, they have gotten significantly worse, especially since 2018. Climate change is real, and it’s destroying our planet.

For more information, please visit:

• “California’s Largest Single Wildfire Spawned Two Massive Firenados — One Was an EF2” 
• “California Fire Tornadoes Had Winds up to 125 Mph”                            
• “Essential California: Fires Have Already Burned More Acres Statewide in 2020 than during All of 2019”