Los Angeles County hits 121 degrees as California wildfires set records
![A firefighter in California](https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/v7hneuyT4SZaar8eKX6zs8-415-80.jpg)
California wildfires have burned nearly 2.1 million acres so far in 2020, surpassing the record for the most land scorched in the state in a single year, CAL Fire Capt. Richard Cordova said Sunday. "This is crazy," Cordova said. "We haven't even got into the October and November fire season, and we've broken the all-time record."
The news came as a record-setting heat wave created new challenges for exhausted firefighters who had finally started making headway containing some of the biggest blazes. The temperature in Woodland Hills, California, reached 121 degrees on Sunday, the highest ever recorded in Los Angeles County. The new record was two degrees above the previous high set in 2006. The National Weather Service said the area could get even hotter as a dangerous heat wave continues in California, Nevada, and Arizona, and records could be broken in other parts of the region. San Luis Obispo recorded a temperature of 120 degrees at the Cal Poly weather station, shattering the previous record of 115 degrees, which was set during a 2017 heat wave. "This is unmatched, just unprecedented, unreal," said John Lindsey, a meteorologist with Pacific Gas and Electric. Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) declared a state of emergency in five counties.
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Harold Maass is a contributing editor at The Week. He has been writing for The Week since the 2001 debut of the U.S. print edition and served as editor of TheWeek.com when it launched in 2008. Harold started his career as a newspaper reporter in South Florida and Haiti. He has previously worked for a variety of news outlets, including The Miami Herald, ABC News and Fox News, and for several years wrote a daily roundup of financial news for The Week and Yahoo Finance.
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