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PARADISE, Calif. (AP) – Authorities who plunged into the deadliest fire in California have released the names of about 100 missing people, many of them in the '80s and' 90s, and dozens of others. Others might still be missing.
When the names were made public, new crews joined the search, and the number of deaths throughout the state climbed to at least 51 on Wednesday, with 48 deaths in northern California and three deaths in the north. Southern California.
"We want to be able to cover as much ground as quickly as possible," said Butte County Sheriff Kory Honea. "It's a very difficult task."
Nearly a week after the fires began, California Governor Jerry Brown and Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke visited the area.
Brown said that he had spoken Wednesday with President Donald Trump and that he had promised "all the resources of the federal government."
"The natural world is power, we create a lot of comfort and security," Brown said. "But at the end of the day, we are physical beings in a biological world."
Zinke said many factors contributed to the flames. He urged people not to "point fingers" and focus on progression.
Sheriff's Department spokeswoman Megan McMann acknowledged that the list of missing persons was incomplete. She added that the detectives feared to be overwhelmed with calls from their parents if the entire list was released.
"We can not release them all at the same time," McMann said. "So, they publish the names in batches." She said the list would be updated.
The authorities have not updated the total number of missing persons since Sunday, when 228 people were reported missing.
Meanwhile, the friends and loved ones of the missing became more and more desperate. A bulletin board in a shelter was filled with photos of missing and information requests.
"I hope you're fine," read a handwritten note on the board filled with notebook sheets. Another had a picture of a missing man: "If seen, have him call you please."
Some of the missing are not on the list, said Sol Bechtold, looking for his mother, Joanne Caddy, 75, whose house was set on fire with the rest of her neighborhood in Magalia, just north of Paradise , the city of 27,000 that was consumed by the flames last week.
Bechtold said that he had talked with the sheriff's office Wednesday morning and that he had confirmed the presence of a missing person case on Caddy. But Caddy, a widow who lived alone and did not drive, was not on the list.
"There are many missing names on the list that they have published," Bechtold said. Community members compiled their own list.
Greg Gibson was one of the readers of the bulletin board Tuesday hoping to find information about his neighbors. They were missing, but he does not know if they tried to escape or they hesitated a few minutes before leaving Paradise, where about 7,700 homes were destroyed.
"It happened so fast, it would have been such an easy decision to stay, but it was a bad choice," said Gibson, of the Chico District, California, church. which served as a refuge for more than 1,000 evacuees. .
Harold Taylor, evacuated, spoke with new friends. The 72-year-old Vietnamese veteran, walking with a cane, said he received a call Thursday morning for an immediate evacuation. He saw the flames leap behind his house, left with the clothes on his back and barely got out.
Along the way, he tried to convince his neighbor to get in his car and evacuate with him, but the neighbor refused. He does not know what happened to his friend.
"We did not have 10 minutes to get out of there," he said. "He was already in flames in the downtown area, in all the local restaurants and in other places," he said.
The search for the dead was supported on portable devices capable of identifying a person's genetic material in a matter of hours rather than within days or weeks.
Before the Paradise tragedy, the deadliest fire ever recorded in California was caused by a fire at Griffith Park in Los Angeles in 1933, which killed 29.
The cause of the fires remained under investigation, but broke out around the time and place when two utilities reported equipment problems. Governor-elect Gavin Newsom, who took office in January, evaded questions about action against utilities if their power lines are held accountable.
The people who lost their homes in northern California sued Pacific Gas & Electric Co. on Tuesday, blaming the utility of this negligence and accusing it of being behind the fire. An e-mail to PG & E was not immediately returned.
Linda Rawlings was fishing all day with her 85 year old husband and father when the fire broke out.
His neighbors next door opened the back door so his three dogs could escape before fleeing the flames. The dogs were recovered several days later, patiently waiting in the charred remains of their home, she said.
After days of uncertainty, Rawlings learned Tuesday that his house "Smurf blue" Magalia had been burned.
She was sitting, looking shocked, on the sidewalk in front of a hotel in Corning.
"Before, you still have hope," she says. "You do not want to give up, but now we know."
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Authors Sudhin Thanawala, Janie Har, Jocelyn Gecker and Olga R. Rodriguez of San Francisco contributed to this report.
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