Hundreds of thousands of acres are burning in Oregon, California and Washington, and weather conditions are no help

About 40 large fires are ravaging the three contiguous West Coast states, and Oregon's governor says some situations have been dire enough to make even firefighters retreat.

Hundreds of thousands of acres are burning and thousands of people have been evacuated in parts of California, Oregon and Washington after extreme heat and high winds combined to let fires tear through territories uncontrolled.

In Oregon, thousands of residents evacuated their homes to escape the flames that have already scorched more than 230,000 acres, Gov. Kate Brown said Tuesday evening.
Fires were threatening homes in places like Clackamas County south of Portland and the Medford and Phoenix areas in Jackson County.