More evacuations as wildfires spread in U.S. Carolinas

More people have been asked to join the hundreds told to leave their homes in the North Carolina and South Carolina mountains as wildfires spread and the forecast for the rest of the week is not encouraging – dry and windy.

A half-dozen large fires are burning in the Blue Ridge Mountains, putting a lot more gray into the landscape and spreading smoke into places like Greenville.

Millions of fallen trees from September's Hurricane Helene are both providing fuel for the wildfires and blocking the logging roads and paths firefighters use to fight the blazes and create fire breaks.

Firefighters have managed to save most of the structures near the fires. Only one injury has been reported – a firefighter in North Carolina got his leg caught under a tree, officials said. About 40 square kilometers have burned.

There is rain in the forecast for the weekend, but it isn't the kind of soaking downpour that can knock a fire out on its own, said a National Weather Service meteorologist in South Carolina.

The bright spot in the forecast for the next week is there is no especially dangerous day where the winds and the dry weather reach potentially disastrous levels like in Los Angeles in January or Gatlinburg, Tennessee, in 2016.

Forestry agencies in North Carolina and South Carolina are already figuring out how to rotate teams of firefighters into and out of the mountains for what could be a long fight.

South Carolina fire officials called for their first round of evacuations Tuesday night. Two fires are burning – a larger one inside Table Rock State Park in Pickens County that has consumed 9.3 square kilometers and another one on Persimmon Ridge in Greenville County that has burned 4.1 square kilometers.

About 250 homes are in the Pickens County evacuation zone with more in neighboring Greenville County, authorities said.

The fires are about 13 kilometers apart and winds are strong enough that authorities decided to evacuate the area between the two fires.

Wednesday's dry weather led to several new fires in western North Carolina. A state of emergency was declared in 34 western counties. At least nine fires were active in that part of the state, officials said.

About two dozen homes and outbuildings have been destroyed in Polk County.

Three fires have burned at least 25 square kilometers in Polk County and in neighboring Henderson County.

Late Tuesday, a wildfire started in far western North Carolina not far from Bryson City. Police were evacuating dozens of people as the fire spread to nearly 2.6 square kilometers.

(Cover: The Black Cove Fire is seen burning in Saluda, North Carolina, U.S., March 26, 2025. /VCG)