(Reuters) – Crews battled nearly a dozen major wildfires across California on Monday that have forced hundreds of people to flee, destroyed dozens of homes and structures and charred thousands of acres of forest land left bone dry by the state’s record drought.The most destructive of the 11 blazes, the Courtney Fire, quickly blackened 320 […]

PORTERVILLE, Calif. (AP) — Hundreds of rural San Joaquin Valley residents no longer can get drinking water from their home faucets because California’s extreme drought has dried up their individual wells, government officials and community groups said. The situation has become so dire that the Tulare County Office of Emergency Services had 12-gallon-per person rations […]

PORTERVILLE, Calif. (AP) — Hundreds of rural San Joaquin Valley residents no longer can get drinking water from their home faucets because California’s extreme drought has dried up their individual wells, government officials and community groups said.   The situation has become so dire that the Tulare County Office of Emergency Services had 12-gallon-per person […]

Did you know? Freshwater jellyfish are showing up in Butte County’s Lake Oroville. It’s likely the low water levels that have some people noticing. This isn’t the first time jellyfish have been spotted in the lake, as their appearance tends to be sporadic, but the population spikes during drought years. The animals are not dangerous […]

You have heard it before: “As California goes, so goes the nation.”  If that is the case, the national economy will be harmed for decades to come because of California’s misplaced priorities today.  Indeed, by emphasizing high-speed rail over water and failing to deal with its debt crisis, California poses a long-term threat to our national economy […]

As California’s drought deepens, 17 communities across the state are in danger of running out of water within 60 to 120 days, state officials said Tuesday. In some communities, wells are running dry. In others, reservoirs are nearly empty. Some have long-running problems that predate the drought. The water systems, all in rural areas, serve […]

A powerful El Niño that had been emerging in the Pacific Ocean is fizzling out, evaporating hopes it will deliver a knockout punch to California’s three-year drought. A new report from scientists at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration decreases the probability of an El Niño — the condition that occurs when warm Pacific Ocean […]

California’s drought has reached epic proportions. Nearly 60 percent of the state is in exceptional drought—the most severe category—and farmers are depleting groundwater reserves at record rates as wildfires break out north and south. Now there’s something else to worry about: drought-triggered earthquakes. If you want to sink a well in California and pump out […]

SACRAMENTO – Governor Edmund G. Brown Jr. today issued an emergency proclamation for the state of California due to the effects of wildfires in El Dorado, Amador, Butte, Humboldt, Lassen, Madera, Mariposa, Mendocino, Modoc, Shasta and Siskiyou counties that have burned thousands of acres, destroyed homes and other structures and damaged critical infrastructure. To read the […]

SONORA, California — Residents living downstream from a popular summer lake in Tuolumne County were warned to watch for flash floods on Sunday after the dam that holds back the lake’s millions of gallons of water sprung leaks, federal and local authorities said. The operator of Twain Harte Dam reported hearing loud booms and seeing […]