California's Dixie Fire explodes in size, grows into nation's largest wildfire

California's Dixie Fire exploded in size overnight and is now the nation's largest wildfire, officials said Friday.

The fire, which obliterated much of the small town of Greenville, California, on Wednesday, grew by 110 square miles overnight and is now 676 square miles in size. That's an area about one-third the size of Rhode Island.

It's also now the third-largest wildfire in California history and is only 35% contained. Fortunately, better weather conditions were expected to aid the fight against the blaze on Friday.

As hot, bone-dry, gusty weather hit California on Wednesday and Thursday, the fire raged through Greenville, a Gold Rush-era Sierra Nevada community of about 1,000, incinerating much of the downtown that included wooden buildings more than a century old.

Read more: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2021/08/06/dixie-fire-explodes-size-nations-largest-wildfire/5512114001/