Wildfires continue to rage on in the West as firefighters battle California's Gifford Fire, which has already burned more than 40,000 acres. CBS News' Jason Allen has the latest.

Santa Maria

Firefighters in California are responding to the Gifford Fire, which has burned at least 49,000 acres, making it the largest active wildfire in the state. Containment has recently decreased from 5% to 3%, as rising temperatures and increasing winds have caused the fire to expand rapidly.

The mountainous terrain in Central California is making it difficult for ground crews to access the fire, necessitating the use of aircraft to drop fire retardant. Evacuations have been ordered for residents, camps, and ranches in the affected area, with only limited road access available for both civilians and emergency responders.

California's Gifford Fire burns more than 40,000 acres

And now we jump out west. Firefighters across California are dealing with more than a dozen wildfires this morning, and some are causing evacuations. The Gifford Fire is the largest, burning through at least 49,000 acres. CBS News correspondent Jason Allen is in Santa Maria, California this morning. Jason, good morning to you once again. You know, earlier when we spoke, you told me this fire at one point was 5% contained, but that's now been revised to only 3%. So explain the conditions firefighters are dealing with. Right, Errol, and you know, that's something that's disappointing for firefighters, right, because they're trying to get a handle around these fires, and anytime that you see containment drop, it means they're losing ground. Now that containment dropped in those early to mid, late afternoon hours, that's when we really saw the Gifford Fire explode in size, and that's as temperatures were coming up and winds were starting to come up too. Now this morning, here where we are in Santa Maria, winds are low if there's anything at all. The temperatures are cool right now, and humidity overnight moderated a little bit. So conditions good for maybe getting some of those lines carved in the spaces where they can right now. But as the afternoon goes on, we're gonna see temperatures come up in the mountains. We'll probably see humidity go down a little bit, and those winds will start to come up. So we're gonna be looking at some similar conditions that led to the fire exploding in size yesterday. And Jason, to help viewers understand the topography of where you are there in Central California, it's not as easy for firefighters to get to the front line because of the mountains. The conditions are quite treacherous, which is why they have to use the aircraft that we see coming in and use the fire retardant material. Help us understand how that's a challenge. You're absolutely correct. You can kind of see some of the rolling landscape here, but that's only until you get to the mountains. So this highway right here, 166, this is the only road that gets across this national forest to the other side. Outside of that, Errol, it's just a lot of jeep trails, a lot of dirt roads, or even walking trails, and it's sparsely populated. But there are homes back there. There are camps there. There are ranches. And so those people who were there, they have had to evacuate. But just as there's one way in and one way out for a lot of people, that's, in a lot of cases, the only roads that firefighters have to go down to, unless they're getting in there with dozers and they're carving out some of their own roads. So aircraft becomes very important in fighting the spread of this fire. A gargantuan effort underway, Jason Allen on the scene. Jason, thank you very much.

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