Sacramento-Red-flag fire warnings were issued at midweek for parts of Southern California due to tinder dry conditions and a new round of Santa Ana winds. The warnings came just days after another Malibu blaze scorched nearly 5,000 acres and destroyed more than 50 homes over the Thanksgiving weekend. The destructive fires underscore just how parched much of the state is, as do the water emergencies declared in several Southern California cities in recent weeks. Local reports said Shasta Lake, at the head of the Sacramento River system near Redding, currently holds just 1.8 million acre-feet of water, well below its 4.6 million capacity. Lake Oroville is holding little more than a third of its 3.5 million acre-feet capacity, and Folsom Lake is barely one-quarter full. On Nov. 26, the California Department of Water Resources told the water agencies that serve two-thirds of the state that they can expect just 25 percent of their normal allocations next year, reportedly down from 60 percent this year. One Central Valley source said the water cutbacks could take some 250,000 farm acres out of production next year, and a court order curtailing water deliveries to the San Joaquin Valley and Southern California from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta to save endangered delta smelt could conceivably take more than 80,000 acres out of cultivation in 2008.
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