5 shocking photos that put the California wildfires in perspective

Northern California is burning, leaving some neighborhoods as nothing more than charred, apocalyptic-seeming wastelands.

So far at least 31 people have died in the wind-fueled wildfires, which are sweeping through wine country just north of San Francisco. Still hundreds more are missing. Once-vibrant neighborhoods like Coffey Park in Santa Rosa have been incinerated, with nothing but ashes left where hundreds of suburban homes once stood. More than 2,800 homes are gone, Santa Rosa city officials said Thursday, as well as some 410,000 square feet of commercial space.

As of Thursday, the fires had decimated more than 191,000 acres of land, or about 300 square miles, across the northern part of the state, the San Francisco Chronicle reports. Below, a look at the horrifying scale of the destruction. Kelly Gonsalves

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