Thomas Fire Jumps County Line: Burns 170k-Acres; Gov. Brown Tells Resident: "This Is Your New Normal"; Thomas Fire Is 10th Largest In State History
BRIGGS: Welcome back. Everybody, thanks for joining us on a Sunday afternoon. I'm Dave Briggs in for Fredricka Whitfield. The tide has not turned in southern California. We are in day six in the furious Santa Ana winds are keeping the areas' largest wildfire alive, the Thomas fire now, the state's 13th most destructive. It's torched an area over twice the size of Atlanta. Overnight, the blaze jumped in the nearby Santa Barbara County. Evacuations there are underway. And for hundreds of homeowners and businesses, the devastation is simply unspeakable. California Governor, Jerry Brown, calls this, quote, the new normal.</s>GOV. JERRY BROWN (D), CALIFORNIA: From history going back a long, long way, there have been very long droughts in California. We are getting some of those returning very bad. And we're going to get them returning more often and then with climate change, some scientists are saying southern California is literally burning up. And burning up as maybe a metaphor or a description and not just with the fire right here, but what we can expect over the next years and decades.</s>BRIGGS: Ominous words there. CNN's Senior Correspondent, Kyung Lah is in Santa Barbara County on the fire line. Kyung, what are you seeing there?</s>KYUNG LAH, CNN SENIOR NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, Dave, it's expected to be a very tough day. We were actually in the hills with the firefighters and they tell you that it's exhausting and they are looking at another rough day specially when you go into the fire line. This is one flank of the fire. You can just see it's burning right there in those hills. And we were amid that area. This is a fire that is in so many ways absolutely unrelenting. It is 173,000 acres, 15,000 structures are threatened, 754 have been destroyed so far. But those figures, Dave, we believe are outdated because while we were up in those hills with firefighters, we saw a house burn right before our eyes. So, what firefighters are hoping is that the weather is going to improve, but the forecast is absolutely the reverse. The dry conditions are continuing. The winds expected to pick up in those hills. It is very, very windy. They are hitting it very hard from the air. You can hear helicopters. I can actually see one over there trying to pick up some water. They are trying to hit it as hard as they can from the air to try to put down these flames. The big concern right now, Dave, is that the fire is going to continue to march northwest. If it heads northwest, an area called Montecito, California which is bit more populated, populated with celebrity homes, larger estates that could also come under evacuation order and come under the threat. They're hoping to try to slow this merciless fire down. Dave?</s>BRIGGS: Terrifying new norm in the words of the governor there. Kyung Lah, thanks so much. Kyung talked about those gusty Santa Ana winds. Let's get to our CNN Meteorologist, Ivan Cabrera, for the latest on the red flag warnings. Ivan, what are we seeing? Are these winds going to pick up?</s>IVAN CABRERA, CNN METEOROLOGIST: They are going to continue to pick up. In fact, I think by later this afternoon we could be looking at the potential for hurricane force winds once again, upwards of 20 million people under a critical fire threat here across multiple counties in the southern California with the Santa Ana winds that continue. And we've seen Kyung Lah there, not much wind where she is, but boy, you get up to those hills and the winds pick up dramatically. In fact, the high wind warnings continue now for Ventura and then to Los Angeles counties, 35 to 45 mile per hour winds. That's bad enough. You get down towards San Diego County, 60 to 75 mile an hour wind gust as we heads for later on today. Seventy four is hurricane, right? So, once again, we could have that potential with very high fire risk. Then you see the red flag warnings that continue here because of those winds that have been relentless coming in from the north and east pushing down toward the southwest. These are the critical things we look at, right? Temperature, that's hasn't been an issue. There has not been a problem. The wind has basically calling the shots here over the last and several days, 40 to 55 mile an hour winds. In general, the humidity, my goodness, I mean, it just can't get any lower. Single digit humidity values, that will continue and, of course, there is no rain inside. That has of course, it's what leads to this problem here. No rain. The conditions not been -- just prying for high fire danger here. Here's is the area of high pressure. Those are the offshore winds that compress and kind of lower the humidity as well as when they come down to slopes that can really get going 60-70 miles an hour. Better conditions as we hit through Monday. And I really think Monday will be the transition day. So then by Tuesday, we're going to see this area with improved winds, right? So now we've gone from critical. This is for tomorrow, elevated still going to be a problem. And I still think we have 40 to 50 mile an hour winds but that area of high pressure will begin to move to the north and they'll begin to weaken here. Look at this, 242 square miles. We mentioned Atlanta twice. The square footage there where we're looking at those square miles, we're looking at basically the size of Chicago as well. So this is going to continue to be a problem. But I think by the time we get into Tuesday, firefighters, this is a one ingredient. If you ask them that is going to be a big help will be the winds coming down and I think that will happen by Tuesday will be down between 20 and 30 miles per hour. That's still high, but it's a much improved condition from hurricane force winds which we have in the last few days.</s>BRIGGS: Any good news, they will take it there in southern California. Ivan Cabrera, thanks so much. Happening right now in New Jersey, Democrat Senator Cory Booker campaigning with Democrat Doug Jones in Alabama which is a couple a days away from crucial Senate race. An African-American turn out will be critical for Doug Jones. Complete team coverage of that race, ahead.