Calm winds early Wednesday had reduced the blazes in the San Bernardino area to mere smoke plumes earlier today, but the fires roared back with a vengeance as predicted 50MPH gusts took hold.

The recent wildfires in Los Angeles, California have burned more than 42,000 acres (17,000 hectares) of land. Nearly 1,000 homes were destroyed, and more than 10,000 residents were evacuated.

A remotely piloted aircraft carrying a NASA sensor flew over much of California earlier this week, gathering information that will be used to help fight more than 300 wildfires burning within the state. Additional flights are planned for next week.

Firefighters are still battling hundreds of wildfires moving across areas of the western U.S. state of California. Nearly 2,000 fires have burned in hot, dry conditions in California since June 20. Officials say lightning caused most of the fires.

When confronted with emergencies or natural disasters, such as the wildfires that raged through San Diego and Los Angeles counties last October or the tornadoes that hit the southern U.S. last week, residents often dial 9-1-1 as their first course of action.

A boy who accidentally started one of the devastating wildfires that ravaged California last month after playing with matches will not be prosecuted, officials have said.

David Beckham, Anthony LaPaglia, several celebrities and retired football players organized a friendly soccer game to raise some $90,000 (EUR 62,000) for people suffered in California wildfires.

AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T) today announced a restoration of telecommunications infrastructure that is one of the largest in AT&T's California history. The company estimates that more than 2,000 telephone poles, 1.5 million feet of copper and 500,000 feet of fiber were destroyed by wildfires in San Diego County alone, surpassing damage from the 2003 fires.

To help California residents affected by the fires stretching across Southern California, AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T) today announced that AT&T Wi-Fi service will be offered free of charge at nearly 600 hot spot locations across Riverside, San Diego, San Bernardino, Los Angeles, Santa Barbara, Orange and Ventura counties.

General Motors and the GM Foundation are putting in place several efforts to help those persons impacted by the devastating fires that have raged across Southern California.

his week, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) held a variety of media briefings related to the California wildfires, but one news conference in Washington, D.C. has raised a few eyebrows. At that news conference, it appeared those asking the questions were reporters, but instead they turned out to be FEMA staffers. The news briefing was a fake. FEMA has apologized, chalking it up to an “error in judgment.”

HP announced that the Hewlett-Packard Company Foundation has made a grant of $2 million to the American Red Cross Disaster Relief Fund for the Southern California wildfires.