Death toll reaches 48 in California’s worst wildfire

The remains of six more fire victims have been found in a northern California town overrun by flames last week, raising the death toll to 48 in the most destructive wildfire in California’s history, Reuters reported. The latest fatality count was announced on Tuesday by Butte County Sheriff Kory Honea after forensic teams with dogs spent the day combing through debris in what was left of the Sierra foothills hamlet of Paradise, about 280 km (175 miles) north of San Francisco. Honea said 100 National Guard troops were being sent in at his request to assist the search for additional human remains. The intensified effort to locate victims came on the sixth day of a blaze that has incinerated more than 8,800 homes and other buildings. Paradise, a town which was once home to 27,000 people, was largely erased hours after the fire began on Thursday. More than 50,000 area residents remained under evacuation orders.