A trail of devastation, flames ripped through the area and destroying everything in its path. Some here chose to stay and fight even after being ordered to get out. Jefferson was able to save her house but frustrated with cal fire response. They could have saved a lot of communities. Reporter fire crews told her they had no water. She says they refused to tie in on a working hydrant on her property. George sam had the same complaint. Fire crew would not hook up to this fire hydrant. That fire hydrant had 15,000 gallons of water they would not hook up to it. Reporter neighborhoods fend for themselves as they work to protect homes with shovels and garden hoses. We reached out to cal fire to see why crew did not use fire hi hydrants. Cal fire leader is saying the first night they only had 15 engines and we are out gunned by Mother Nature so they were forced to triage their response in order to save the most homes. Reporter tonight staffing has greatly improved. 26 more engines from out of state are here at the fire and by wednesday National Guard troops will be moving in. Theyre going to be used as field crews. Reporting live in santa cruz county, marianne favro, nbc bay area news. Thank you, marianne. You can see the santa cruz mountains. You can see the aircraft coming in one after the other picking up water to drop off the flames. They have eyes above the helicopter, thats how they are filming this making sure pie lester hopilots and crew members are safe doing this. Evacuation warnings continue for parts of the trivalley. Morgan hill now, the south bay, hundreds of evacuated residents can only watch and worry as the szu fire gets closer to town. The jackson oaks and Holiday Lakes estates. Some people tell us they cant believe this is all happening. When it hits home is a shock. It is hard reality when it is imminent. Hitting home for a lot of us. Morgan hill dodged another fire coming from a different direction. That was contained before it could reach town. Coming up at 6 00. Robert honda will join us more on another growing worry, looters right there in morgan hill and Scotts Valley area. The lnu burned more than 350,000 acres. The fire is 22 contained. Five people have died. Two in napa county and three in Solano County. Tonight the families are urging neighbors to listen for evacuation orders. Nbc bay areas Jodi Hernandez is joining us with more on their stories. Reporter so, so sad, several families are dealing with the unthinkable of the loss of a loved one. We talked to one man who lost his mother. She was the most caring people i have ever met. I mean i am hoping if i can get myself. Reporter Robert Mcneil is dealing with the loss of his mother. He say his best friend, she died last week along with her boyfriend leo mcdermot. They called the flames off. It went through the whole canyon and nobody had a chance. Reporter mcneil said his mother drove out but came back for her boyfriend who was in a wheelchair. The Text Messages stopped after she said she had to go pin to the cellar. A makeshift fire shelter built on the side of the hill. This is where searchers found their remains. How scared she was. Her biggest fear was actual lilburning. She didnt want to be cremated and man, thats pretty much the way things ended up. Reporter the only belonging mcneil could find from his mom was a porcelain trinket. Dont worry about your stuff, your family is going to have to deal with the after math of you not getting out. Thats way worse than losing your property. It is just it is. Reporter we are back here live in the zone where this fire blew through here without any warning. Again, five people have lost their lives in this lnu complex fire. Three in napa county and two in Solano County. Reporting live, i am Jodi Hernandez, nbc bay area news. It is heartbreaking for that family. We do appreciate him talking with us and especially talking to jodi there. Here is some good news, no more red flag warnings in the north bay. Lightning strikes and high winds never materialized, cal fire officials giving us their briefing today. They were relieved with the break of the weather and Additional Resources coming in. Firefighters are reminding everyone that things can change quickly. One woman who grew up in the north bay evacuated over the weekend tell old us many of her friends lost their homes and hoping the fire does not get near downtown. Cal fire urged people to follow the warnings and be ready to get out. Those warnings are changing by the day and changing by the hour. Chris is with us keeping track for all of us. A lot is going on, chris chmura. Let me show you what we are talking about. In red and yellow, we have the rackuati evacuation warnings. These are hot spots thermal energy indicating where the fires likely are and have been the past couple of hours. As you noted raj, this situation can change quickly. I have good news pushing towards the pacific ocean. We have an evacuation warning here and that evacuation has been downgraded to an evacuation warning. This this is east of the sonoma coast and west of myers great road and south of fourth ross road and right here right up against the pacific ocean. Szu, you can see the size is massive especially when you map it the same time as the fire. Morgan hill where they had evacuation warnings right against evacuation orders. Do stay tune. Chris, thank you. Hazy skies around 101. Prompting people to clean up the bad air that seeped inside their home. The shelves at San Francisco used to be full here and now shelves are empty. If you already have one, doctors say they are not perfect but can keep the air in your home a little cleaner. Another tip is if bad air is getting inside your home through a door or window that does not seal completely, try to use a towel to cover up that tyiny ga. Lets get to jeff ranieri. When will we see relief . Some fog tomorrow morning will stir up a little bit but well remain in the unhealthy category through tomorrow. Last night and early tomorrow morning, we dodged the bullet, we had thunderstorms in the sierra foothills and getting close to the bay area but no lightning strikes. That was some good news. We got a few showers. I wanted to show you the Doppler Radar and you can see as this loops around, look at all the lightning strikes we had here across the sierra and also the central valley. Here we go, it is going to start to loop around here in about three seconds, right about now and take your eyes right there to the interstate 5 corridor and you can see right there quite a few lightning strikes in the Early Morning hours. We got real lucky on that. Smoke for the interior valley. A little bit of fog beginning to mix in at the current moment. Our fire forecast here across the three main fire zones well see some cooler weather tomorrow, wind gusts of only 20 miles per hour. Thats also some good news for firefighters. I will take you over to the real close look of the forecast in a few minutes. Thank you, jeff. This is not normal. We had 7,000 fires in california so far this year, doubled what we had last year specifically at this time. The governor addressed that fire specifically today and what makes a difference than the other hundreds of fires raging around california, Jessica Aguirre is here with us joining us with the details. The governor opened his briefing with those startling numbers that we had 7,000 fires this year and we are not mid way from fire season. 14,000 firefighters are on the frontlines battling 625 fires, he says this moment is historic for us. The governor pointed out there had been 13,000 lightning strikes since midaugust. He says it is really unusual weather. The governor believes it points to a specific phenomenon especially when it comes to the czu fire which is burning in san mateo and santa cruz counties. A lot of redwoods thats simply never seen forest fires because the weather conditions and lightning. We are in a different climate and we are dealing with different climate conditions that are precipitating fires like which we have not seen in modern recorded history for us that are well covered and historically immune from significant fires. Reporte the governor pointing to Climate Change may be whats happening in terms of this wildfire season. There are 17 fires in the state, all resources are used and aids from out across the state and out of state. A lot of resources are coming in. Coming up at 6 00, well talk about the historic fire season, you know, colliding with the historic pandemic. How do you keep people safe . Those evacuees forced from their homes when you put them in evacuation centers, traditionally those are tight locations. What protocols are in place to make sure we dont go from one terrible situation to another terrible situation. This could be a big problem moving forward. Well see in a few minutes, thanks jessica. Up next at 5 00. Not just people forced out of their homes, well show you the east bay team helping animals to ease the flames. A bay area county has been dropped off the governors covid19 safety list. Sky ranger over in the czu fire. This picture was just from a few minutes ago. This fire burning nearly 80,000 acres and about 80,000 people forced to leave their home right now. This fire has killed one person in santa cruz county, containment right about 13 . Every year we talk about the animals in the fire zone, this time is so much different. We have three different major fire zones. Thats a lot of animals and a lot of livestock. Pete suratos is showing us what a team in alameda is doing to help. Reporter in fire zones, so many Animal Shelters are running out of space. One Animal Shelter is doing their part to make sure they are getting the help they need. We have thousands of displaced animals when these fires start burning in california and throughout the state. Reporter hes explaining the impact all fires are happening on animals across the region. Most people make sure their pets are safe, some dont get a chance. There are probably a few thousands that are displaced may run away from home or get lost and some people when they have to find emergency housing cant take their animals with them so there is a big need for testimony pri temporary boarding. Reporter they drove to Solano County to take in new strays and provide emergency boarding for pets of vevacuees. We hold animals that are already up for adoption, that created stays for the in coming animals and bring those animals down here and get them adopted. Reporter all together, alameda relocated more than a dozen pets. The goal is to work with more shelters in a feeling the pitch during this unprecedented times and in the process help to find homes for the animals left booinehind. Feel good to know that we can mobilize quickly and create space. Give us a couple of days to assess medically and get to know them and their behaviors and now we started the adoption process and we have already a lot of people lining up with these great dogs and cats. Reporter in alameda county, pete suratos. Napa county is no longer on the governors watch list. It is the first area thats removed. What does it mean fiorior napa county . The county is no longer subject to indoor business closures and schools can start inperson classes in two weeks. Lets bring in jeff ranieri, what do you see here the next few days . It still remains a pretty complex picture. You said it perfectly, there are so many different layers to it. There are no major wind events over the next two or three days or the next week. Thats probably a sigh of relief i can guarantee you for those firefighters. The smoke beginning to improve a little bit at the coastline because we have some fog moving in. The next 24 hours, our beaches will have some best qualities. The air are getting mixed up tomorrow, air quality. Overall it will be slightly better just because the fall is mix things for us. A brands n brand new update for us, we are stormfree right now. I want to draw your attention to something i am following right now. Thats over night, we had some thunderstorm chances north of the bay area. Well follow that extremely closely. Lets take a look at the fire zones, north bay, south bay and santa cruz mountains. As we zoom in in the north bay, we have tomorrows forecast and the fire zones, we are looking at a cooler 89 degrees. Most of the hot spots were right there on the northern side of the fire perimeter. Down to the south bay, cooler temperatures tomorrow, 86, wind gusts only of 20 miles per hour. Most of the fire activities on the north and the western side. For the santa cruz mountains, we have you at 78 tomorrow. Thats also an improvement and wind gusts of just 20. Fire hot spots in the north and south side. Now the forecast tomorrow well stay right here, upper 80s to about 90 in land. I got 90 in livermore and mid80s for san jose and 60s right there. Not extremely hot. Well have a bit of humidity in the mix. 1 00 tomorrow morning, we do have storms over the sierra and well to the north of us. Here is the thing well follow. By 5 00 a. M. We could see some thunderstorms popping up to the north of the bay area and thunderstorms can be kind strong sometimes. If anything gets close to us, well let you know and right here a lot of drizzles. A lot of layers in the forecast. Dry lightning into tomorrow and 35 chance on we understand and 10 chance on thursday. For the in land valleys we are going with 90s over the next seven days. Janelle and raj, the thing we are looking at next week we could another surge of humid air. We could be locked into this on and off again human pattern for the next ten days. We are seeing this air from the south moving in. It is much different than our normal air pattern flowing. Thats why the weather has been s so unusual and kinds of wacky r us. Thank you. One of the most highprofile prisoner is back in the headline. The changes of Scott Petersons future. The state Supreme Court court over turned the sentence of scott peterson. The court ruled the trial judge wrongly excluded jourors who wee opposed to the death penalty. The court upheld peterson guilty for it. A new hearing or accept a sentence of life without parole for peterson. The republicans are in the national spotlight. The National Convention kicking off in north carolina. President trump was in charlotte today as more than 300 delegates nominated him for a second term. Theyre there in person. Unlike the democrats virtual convention. The Convention Program moves onto washington, d. C. A couple of hours from now, the notable speaker, don trump jr. And nikki haley. Joe biden picked up more endorsements today, including jeff flake. Well be back in a moment. Hi. Were glad you came in. Whats on your mind . Can you help keep these guys protected online . Easy. Connect to the xfi gateway. What about wireless data options for the family . You can customize and save. What about internet speeds that can keep up with my gaming . Lets hook you up with the Fastest Internet from xfinity. And now with our stores reopening, were putting Healthy Practices in place. Come visit a store today. Stop in or book an appointment online at a time that works for you. Now thats simple, easy, awesome. Ask. Shop. Discover at your local xfinity store today. Sky ranger over the czu fire burning in the santa cruz mountain. This fire destroyed 150 structures. A 70yearold man was killed in this fire. People are forced to leave their home and only 13 contained. Well have a lot more on this fire and others tonight at 6 00. Tonight millions bracing for double trouble alodge the gulf coast. Tropical storm marco taking aim right now. Al roker will have the new tracks disturbing video, a black man, jacob blake, shot multiple times in the back by police in wisconsin. Anger erupting in the streets, the National Guard called in. Night one of the rnc, president trumps unannounced appearance, when he said top adviser kel Kellyanne Conway set to speak this week after her unexpected announcement