‘Oh, my gosh, it’s the end of the world’: State of emergency declared as wildfires rage on

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Silvia Petatan awoke on Monday night to the stench of smoke and an alert on her phone telling her to leave her home as flames tore down the rugged hillside at the end of her cul-de-sac in Ventura, Calif.

Outside, the sky was red, the air was thick with smoke and Ms. Petatan's black boots turned white as she trampled through the thick ash. "I thought, 'Oh my gosh, it's the end of the world,'" she recalled. She grabbed a few bags to fill with pyjamas and blankets, doused her small bungalow with a garden hose and fled.

The blazes that have torn through Southern California and forced more than 200,000 people from their homes have capped off a difficult year for Ms. Petatan. She had been caring for her sister's three children since her sibling was deported from the United States to Mexico. Earlier this year, her brother left the United States over fears of an immigration crackdown by President Donald Trump. Six months ago, he was killed in Mexico.

Now, she and the children were leaving their home for a Red Cross emergency shelter at a local fairground, where the youngest, Enrique, celebrated his ninth birthday on Thursday with the gift of a few fake plastic guns – the only toys the children could scrounge up in the shelter amid the chaos.

As Southern California entered its fifth straight day of wildfires, firefighters fought to control flames in some parts of the state, even as new blazes were breaking out in other areas. Mr. Trump declared an emergency in California in response to a request from Governor Jerry Brown. The announcement allows federal agencies to co-ordinate disaster-relief efforts in the region.

By Friday, more than 8,700 firefighters were battling six fires burning in the region stretching north of Los Angeles to San Diego. The flames have so far consumed more than 57,000 hectares, destroyed 500 homes and forced tens of thousands to leave their neighbourhoods.

The fires are the largest to hit Los Angeles since 1961 and the most significant Southern California has seen since a 2007 wildfire forced nearly a million people to flee their homes. However, authorities believe only one person has been killed in the blazes, unlike the deadly wildfires that swept through Northern California's wine country in October, levelling neighbourhoods and claiming 40 lives.

Evacuation orders were lifted for several neighbourhoods around Los Angeles late on Thursday night, including parts of Bel-Air. But, in Ventura, a beach-side community north of Los Angeles, the largest of the wildfires continued to rage. Fire officials said the blaze, which they dubbed the Thomas Fire, was 10 per cent under control. Several neighbourhoods that weren't evacuated remained under a boil-water advisory.

Separately, in Bonsall, an area north of San Diego that houses several equestrian facilities, a small brush fire that started on Thursday morning quickly spread into a massive blaze. By Friday, it had destroyed 85 homes and forced 10,000 residents to evacuate. Local officials said 25 horses had died in the fires that shut down an interstate highway.

The gusty offshore Santa Ana winds that have fuelled many of the blazes died down on Friday. But the National Weather Service said it was extending its "red flag" extreme-weather warning until Sunday evening, over concerns that the conditions will continue to be unseasonably dry and windy.

Firefighters have been hampered by difficult terrain, exceptionally dry vegetation and strong winds that have sent embers flying through the air more than a kilometre away.

"We do have an uphill battle over the next couple of days," Ventura County Fire Captain Brendan Ripley told a community meeting on Thursday night. "If the weather changes … we're hoping to get the upper hand and get control of this fire."

Returning home on Friday, Ms. Petatan found her street still blanketed by a thick layer of smoke. But her bungalow survived. Even so, she was worried about her home. "Oh it's so dry," she said, tapping her foot on the tall dead grasses that surround her small house.

This is the second fire Ms. Petatan has seen in the past 12 years. She has thought about moving somewhere less at risk, but sees little opportunity in the region's tight housing market. "I wish I could move," she said. "But where? It's not easy."