From an article by Rebecca Lindsey on the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Climate.gov website:

Highlights:

• • A trifecta of fire-friendly climate conditions set the stage for the January 2025 fires: back-to-back wet winters that boosted vegetation, a record-dry fall, and an extremely strong Santa Ana wind event. 
  • By one estimate, record-low fall precipitation had a bigger influence on the exceptionally low vegetation moisture than the near-record summer and fall temperatures.
  • A preliminary attribution analysis concluded that long-term global warming and the development of La Niña contributed roughly equally to making the extreme fire weather conditions more likely and more extreme.
  • The most effective near-term strategies to lower risk are controlling unwanted human ignitions under high-risk conditions, using fire-resistant building materials and landscaping, and locating development in lower-risk areas.

Click here to read the full article.