US: Wildfires in Eastern Washington Destroy 600 Buildings, Force Evacuation of 5,000 Homes

US authorities announced that wildfires, which remained out of control on Sunday in eastern Washington, led to the evacuation of approximately 5,000 homes and the destruction of nearly 600 homes, businesses, and other structures.

The fires consumed more than 21 square kilometers around Spokane, the second-largest city in Washington state, and were among dozens of blazes burning across the western United States, straining the capacity of federal, state, and local agencies to combat them. No fatalities have been reported so far from the fires in the Spokane area.

Meanwhile, firefighting teams, using bulldozers and helicopters for the tenth consecutive day, continued their efforts to battle a fire that had consumed nearly 1,360 square kilometers of grassland in western Idaho and eastern Oregon.