America's biggest vineyards are in danger...
On the off chance you haven't heard (don't worry, there's a lot going on in the world at the moment - it's hard to keep up), a series of wild fires in California are currently ravaging the local landscape.
As it stands, nobody knows quite how they started - but the combination of hot weather and a dry, arid landscape means that they spread quickly and putting them out is a massive, massive task.
It's all incredibly sad - so far, one fire in northern California's Lake County has destroyed 73,000 acres of landscape - and it's still going. Approximately 600 people have been left homeless, and at least three individuals are thought to have died.
But it gets worse, because people's careers are at risk now too. The fire is headed for Napa and Sonama - the two areas that make up the heart of the state's wine industry. As a result, all of the vineyards in the area have been evacuated, so nobody can tend to the grapes - meaning that even if the fires pass them by, the harvest will be affected, potentially destroying hundreds of businesses and causing prices of Californian wines (which make up 90 per cent of the American wine industry) to rise dramatically.
'We are all not sure of what is happening right now and we are just hoping for the best,' said Cheryl Lucido, the owner of Laujor Estate, told the Guardian, adding that their priority is getting the fires under control and preventing any more homes from being destroyed. 'Vineyards are a good fire break and this can help the fires burn slower and assist firefighters to help stop the fire... Right now it is just a wait and see and hope that it will be all right.'
