Obama declares state of emergency at site of out-of-control Washington fires

Emergency workers from Australia and New Zealand are travelling to the western United States to help fight raging wildfires in five states including Washington, where Barack Obama has declared a state of emergency as massive fires are burning out of control.

Obama’s order authorizes the Department of Homeland Security and Federal Emergency Management Agency to coordinate disaster relief efforts. It covers 11 counties in central and eastern Washington as well as the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation, the Kalispel Tribe of Indians, the Spokane Tribe of Indians, and the Confederated Tribes and Bands of the Yakima Nation.

The specialists from New Zealand and Australia will join the nearly 29,000 firefighters working in Washington, Montana, Oregon, Idaho and California to combat daunting blazes that have overtaken the region.

“The crews being deployed are very experienced in dealing with large wildfires having handled fires on similar terrain across Australia,” Craig Lapsley, emergency management commissioner for the Australian state of Victoria, said in a statement.

The crew from across the Pacific includes 56 people from Australia and 15 from New Zealand. They are set to arrive in Boise, Idaho, for a briefing over the weekend before being dispatched across the western US.

The US Department of Defense sent more than 200 active-duty soldiers to fight fires in the region, the first time the Boise-based fire agency has used that option since 2006.

Three have men died fighting the fires in Washington, where blazes have been particularly strong this week. The seasonal firefighters employed by the US Forest Service died after their vehicle crashed and was overtaken by flames in the worst wildfire fatality incident in the state since July 2001. The deceased were identified as: Tom Zbyszewski, 20; Andrew Zajac, 26; and Richard Wheeler, 31.

Washington’s governor, Jay Inslee, on Thursday called the fires raging across the state “an unprecedented cataclysm”. The state has asked federal officials to approve an emergency declaration, which would provide financial assistance to the state.

“These fires have burned a big hole in the state’s heart,” Inslee said.

For the first time in state history, Washington’s department of natural resources (DNR) is accepting volunteers to assist with fighting fires and to donate equipment.

The blazes began when lightning strikes met unusually high winds last week. The fires showed no signs of ceasing on Friday, after numerous evacuation orders were called from Thursday night into the morning.

A cold front is moving into the region and while it will create more tolerable temperatures for firefighters, the National Weather Service said the accompanying low relative humidity “will create extreme fire growth potential”.