‘Explosive’ Fire Tornado Seen in Terrifying California Wildfire Footage

Timelapse footage captured by the University of California San Diego showed a terrifying development in the Park Fire as flames spawned a fire tornado on Thursday.

The Park Fire ignited on Wednesday afternoon and quickly spread to encompass more than 164,000 acres in Butte and Tehema counties, spurring evacuation orders and warnings issued by the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (CAL FIRE). The wildfire has since grown to become the largest wildfire currently burning in California, more than four times the size of the Lake Fire in Santa Barbara that started weeks ago and is the next largest in the state.

In addition to its quick growth, the Park Fire also produced a fire tornado, a phenomenon seen only with the most “explosive” wildfires, National Weather Service (NWS) Warning Coordination Meteorologist Courtney Carpenter said.

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“Timelapse of the #ParkFire just northeast of Chico in Northern California, currently producing a fire tornado,” extreme storm chaser Colin McCarthy posted on X, formerly Twitter, with the UC San Diego footage on Thursday evening. “The fire has grown an insane 120,000 acres (~4x the size of San Francisco) in a little over 24 hours. The fire was caused by arson after a man allegedly pushed a burning car into a ravine, sparking the blaze.”

Carpenter said fire tornadoes are hard to document, and the NWS doesn’t issue tornado warnings for the phenomenon.

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“When a fire gets going and exhibits extreme fire behavior, the fire creates its own weather so it can produce severe thunderstorms with lightning and really gusty winds,” Carpenter said. “It can cause that smoke plume it generates to rotate like a tornado.”

A suspect in the alleged arson has since been arrested, although the flames continue to rage. As of Friday morning, firefighters had contained only 3 percent of the blaze, according to a CAL FIRE update.

“Today the Park Fire burned very actively with hot, dry weather over the region,” the most recent CAL FIRE summary of the fire said. “The fire area is currently under a Red Flag Warning due to gusty winds and low humidity. The fire is burning in some grass, brush, mixed timber and dead vegetation.”

Two roads were closed because of the flames on Thursday, and closures have spread rapidly in less than 24 hours. As of Friday morning, several road closures were in place, including Route 32 at the junction with State Route 36 in Tehama County and at Bruce Road in Butte County, Cohasset Road at Rock Creek, Upper Park Road at Wildwood, Keefer and Hicks, Hicks and Oasis, forks of the Butte Bridge, 32 and Yosemite eastbound, 99 and Meridian, 32 and Upper Humboldt, the Meridian/Butte Tehama Line, and Cohasset/Eaton.

An update issued by CAL FIRE on Thursday night said the fire had caused two minor injuries and destroyed “numerous structures.”