According to a 2019 report, the Ranch Fire was started by a rancher who had inadvertently sparked dry grass while hammering a metal stake while trying to find a wasp nest. The fire threatened the University of California Hopland Research and Extension Center.

What caused the Ranch fire in California?

Per the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, the Ranch Fire “was caused by a spark or hot metal fragment landing in a receptive fuel bed.” More specifically, the spark was caused by a property owner using a hammer to drive a metal stake into the ground to plug an underground yellow jacket nest.

What caused the fires 2020?

Abatzoglou noted that some of the harrowing scenes across Northern California in 2020 were due to an extreme and unusual dry lightning siege in mid-August that ignited thousands of fires in one night.