San Francisco, Sep 19 (IANS) American airplane giant Boeing has announced $700,000 in grants to help communities affected by the raging wildfires along the US West Coast.
In an announcement on Friday, Boeing said that it was providing $500,000 to the American Red Cross to support its fire relief efforts in Washington, Oregon and California, Xinhua news agency.
The remaining $200,000 will go towards providing food assistance in these states where a significant amount of the company’s employees live and work.
“Thousands of our families, friends and neighbours have been displaced around the west,” said Stan Deal, president and CEO of Boeing Commercial Airplanes and the company’s senior executive in the region.
“We are committed to helping them through this exceptionally challenging time.”
Don Herring, chief development officer at the American Red Cross, expressed his gratitude for Boeing’s support, adding that they have taken extra safety precautions due to the pandemic to ensure people impacted by the wildfires feel safe.
The raging wildfires have so far killed more than 30 people and forced tens of thousands from their homes, the BBC reported.
The US National Interagency Fire Centre has said that firefighters are battling 106 large wildfires in the region.
California and Oregon have seen some of the worst of the blazes.
According to the National Interagency Fire Center, 6.7 million acres have been burned this year, so far.
Scientists have said that the wildfires were the worst in 18 years and plumes of smoke from the fires are so large, they have crossed the US and the Atlantic Ocean, carried by the jet stream, and have reached the skies of Europe.
–IANS
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