Thousands of firefighters were battling a wildfire in northern California on Saturday that exploded in size, scorching an area about the size of Los Angeles — one of several blazes tearing through the western United States and Canada amid dry, hot and windy conditions.

The forecast called for cooler temperatures that could help slow the Park Fire, the largest blaze so far this year in California.

The Park Fire’s intensity and dramatic spread led fire officials to make unwelcome comparisons to the monstrous Camp Fire, which burned out of control in nearby Paradise in 2018, killing 85 people and torching 11,000 homes.

And Paradise again was near the danger zone.

The entire town was under an evacuation warning Saturday, one of several communities in Butte County.

Evacuation orders were also issued for Plumas, Tehama and Shasta counties.

An evacuation warning calls for people to prepare to evacuate and await instructions. An evacuation order means to leave immediately.

More than 130 structures have been destroyed by the Park Fire so far as the inferno barreled through steep mountainous terrain — creating tough conditions overnight for crews.

The fire stood at 480 square miles (1,243 square kilometers) on Friday night — just shy of the size of the city of Los Angeles, which covers roughly 503 square miles (1,302 square kilometers).

The blaze was moving quickly north and east after igniting Wednesday, when authorities said a man pushed a burning car into a gully in Chico and then calmly blended in with others fleeing the scene.

Communities elsewhere in the U.S. West and Canada also were under siege Saturday from a fastmoving blaze sparked by lightning that sent people fleeing on fireringed roads in rural Idaho to a new blaze that was causing evacuations in eastern Washington.

More than 110 active fires covering 2,800 square miles (7,250 square kilometers) were burning in the U.S. on Friday, according to the National Interagency Fire Center.

AP video shot by Noah Berger