Not in history has a modern imperial city been so completely destroyed. San Francisco is gone.

Jack London after the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and fire^[1]

This article is a list of notable fires.

Town and city fires

Painting of the Cathedral and the Academy building after the Great Fire of Turku, by Gustaf Wilhelm Finnberg, 1827

Building or structure fires

Transportation fires

Mining (including oil and natural gas drilling) fires

This is a partial list of fire due to mining: human-made structures to extract minerals, ores, rock, petroleum, natural gas, etc.

Forest and countryside fires

• 1933 – Griffith Park Fire in Los Angeles, California, killed 29 firefighters on October 3
• 1933 – Tillamook Burn, Oregon
• 1936 – Kursha-2, 1200 killed
• 1936 – Bandon, Oregon, Bandon's entire commercial district was destroyed, total loss stated at the time was US$3 million, with 11 fatalities.
• 1937 – Blackwater fire of 1937 in Shoshone National Forest in Wyoming, killed 15 firefighters on August 21
• 1939 – Black Friday bushfires in Australia. 71 people killed.
• 1949 – The great forest fire of 1949 in the Landes Forest, wildfire, 256,000 acres (1,040 km²) lost, 82 people killed.
• 1949 – Mann Gulch fire
• 1953 – Rattlesnake Fire, set by an arsonist named Stan Pattan, in Mendocino National Forest near Willows, California, killed 15 firefighters on July 9
• 1963 – Paraná forest fire, 20,000 square kilometres destroyed, killing at least 110, with 5,000 houses burned in September.
• 1966 – Serra de Sintra forest fire, outskirt of Lisbon, Portugal, 26.6 square kilometres (6,600 acres) destroyed, killing 26.
• 1967 – 1967 Tasmanian fires in Tasmania, Australia, 62 killed and over 900 injured.
• 1971 – Kure forest fire, Kure, western Honshū, Japan, 18 firefighters killed on April 27
• 1975 – Fire on the Lüneburg Heath in north Germany, 80 square kilometres destroyed, 7 fatalities including 5 firefighters killed on August 10
• 1983 – Ash Wednesday bushfires killed 75 people and injured more than 2600 others in South Australia and Victoria.
• 1987 – 1987 Daxing'anling wildfire in People's Republic of China, burned for a month
• 1988 – Yellowstone fires of 1988 largest, most expensive wildfire in the history of the National Park Service, at the world's first national park.
• 1991 – Oakland firestorm of 1991, Oakland, California, U.S., killed 25 people and injured 150 others.
• 1994 – Isabela Island forest fire, Galápagos Island, Ecuador, 12 km² lost in April.
• 1994 – South Canyon Fire on Storm King Mountain near Glenwood Springs, Colorado kills fourteen firefighters on July 6.
• 2002 – Biscuit Fire, the largest wildfire in the recorded history of Oregon
• 2003 – Canberra bushfires, Australian Capital Territory, 4 killed and 435 injured
• 2003 – Cedar Fire, destroyed over 550 homes and many acres of land, Southern California
• 2003 – 2003 Okanagan Mountain Park Fire, British Columbia
• 2005 – Eyre Peninsula bushfire, South Australia, 9 killed, at least 113 injured and 79 houses destroyed
• 2006 – Pilliga forest fire burned out 740 km² on just its first day
• 2007 – October 2007 California wildfires
• 2008 – Summer 2008 California wildfires, second costliest in US history to extinguish.
• 2009 – Black Saturday bushfires In February, at the end of the early 2009 southeastern Australia heat wave, bushfires swept through the Australian state of Victoria killing 180 people, injuring around 500, destroying at least 2029 homes.
• 2010 – 2010 Russian wildfires, 2000 buildings, 8000 km² destroyed, 54 killed.^[7]
• 2010 – Mount Carmel forest fire in Israel led to 44 fatalities.
• 2011 – Fires across parts of Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, during the Easter holidays, destroying many parks and forests.
• 2011 – Summer fire outbreak across Texas claimed almost 4 million acres in over 21,000 fires. Approximately 7,000 homes were lost and approximately 50,000 homes in direct danger were saved by fire departments across the state.
• 2011 – Two wildfires burn in Bastrop, Texas; 2 people killed, 34,000 acres burned, over 1000 houses and other structures destroyed
• 2011 – Swinley Forest, UK, 12 fire services attended from various counties to extinguish this forest fire in Berkshire.^[8][9]
• 2015 – Sampson Flat bushfires, Mount Lofty Ranges, South Australia, destroyed 12,500 hectares (31,000 acres) of native forest, farmland, vineyards and 27 houses, with no human fatalities
• 2016 – A series of wildfires raged across mainland Portugal and the Portuguese archipelago of Madeira.
• 2017 – Between 30 and 40 gorse fires raged across the country [Ireland] between late April and early May. Cloosh Valley saw the worst of these fires with 1,500 hectares (5.8 sq mi) of forest damaged.^[10]
• 2017 – A series of wildfires, burn across Pedrógão Grande and Nodeirinho in Portugal, killing at least 66 people and injuring at least 204 others.
• 2017 – Fires consumed hundreds of thousands of acres of Oregon's Deschutes National Forest, Columbia River Gorge National Scenic Area, and the Willamette National Forest during August and September, causing evacuations and road closures. Fires included the Chetco Bar Fire and the Eagle Creek Fire, which also spread into Skamania County, Washington, United States.^[11][12][13]
• 2018 – Camp Fire in California. Began November 8, 2018; caused 85 deaths and destroyed 18,804 structures.^[14][15]
• 2018 – Woolsey Fire in California, which broke out on the same day as the Camp Fire. Resulted in three deaths and the destruction of 1,643 structures,^[16] among them, the homes of notable celebrities.
• 2019 – 2019 Nelson fires – Two wildfires, 20 kilometres apart in Nelson and Tasman District, New Zealand, started on 5 February 2019. The Pigeon Valley fire was described as the country's largest since 1955 and New Zealand's largest aerial firefight on record with 22 helicopters involved.^[17]
• 2019 – Gospers Mountain bushfire – Starting on October 29, 2019, this rapidly became the largest single-ignition fire from lightning strike Australia has ever seen, reaching over 512,000 hectares (1,980 sq mi) with a perimeter of 1,503 kilometres (934 mi), the Gospers Mountain Fire has officially been set to contained on January 13, 2020, at 12:00.^[18]
• 2020 – Cagua fire – On 23 January 2020, a fire was started in the Agrícola del Lago reed bed in Cagua, Aragua state, Venezuela. Eleven people were confirmed to have died as a result of the fire, all but two being minors.^{[19][20][21][22]}

See also

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Fires.

• List of fires by locations
  • List of fires in Canada
  • List of fires in China
  • List of fires in Kyoto
• List of accidents and disasters by death toll
• List of the largest artificial non-nuclear explosions

References

Further reading

• "Deadly drink fanned the flames of 1875". Irish Examiner. 2014-11-04. Retrieved 2020-06-09. Irish Examiner article on 1875 fire