Flames burn from a destroyed home Flames burn from a destroyed home's natural gas line during the Skirball Fire in the Bel Air neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, on Wednesday, December 6, 2017. (Photo: Patrick T. Fallon/Bloomberg)

(Bloomberg) – As blame for California's wildfires rises over Sacramento like smoke from last year's blazes, the state is being forced to confront the possibility that it'll happen again in 2018.

California's drought is worsening, and blazes have charred more acres in the first six months of this year than they did in the same period in 2017, a year that ultimately set records for destruction and deaths. The state is covered with dried-out brush and the skeletal branches of 129 million trees killed by a bark-beetle infestation.

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