Smoke rises in Angeles Nation Forest Aug. 29, 2022.
Brush fires burned about 15 acres and forced a road closure Monday at the start of what is expected to be one of the warmest weeks of the year in Southern California.
The fires, Gulch Fire 1 and 2, were burning in the same area near San Gabriel Dam. The location is near Mile Marker 21 along San Gabriel Canyon Road in the mountains above the San Gabriel Valley east of Los Angeles.
Route 39 was closed north of Azusa.
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The fires were in heavy to moderate brush. Fuel moisture levels are well below historic averages in parts of Southern California, meaning vegetation is drying out more quickly this year. Dry vegetation is one significant factor in the spread of wildfires.
Temperatures in the area were in the high 90s early Monday afternoon.
No structures were immediately threatened in Angeles National Forest.
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Details about a cause were not immediately available.
The state is coming of one of its driest late winters on record, leaving hillsides covered in dry brush.
California continues to face longer wildfire seasons as a direct result of climate change, according to CAL FIRE.
Scientists say climate change has made the West warmer and drier over the last three decades and will continue to make weather more extreme and wildfires more frequent and destructive. California has seen its largest, most destructive and deadliest wildfires in the last five years. In 2018, a massive blaze in the Sierra Nevada foothills destroyed much of the city of Paradise and killed 85 people, the most deaths from a U.S. wildfire in a century.
