The world’s largest tree is protected from a furious wildfire — until further notice.
The General Sherman, a 275-foot-tall, 36-foot-wide giant sequoia that pinnacles over the path in California’s Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Park, stayed out of risk from the KNP Complex fire Saturday, the media revealed.
Yet, the 18,000-section of land blaze, sparked by a Sept. 9 lightning storm, has consumed a western piece of the forest — and came alarmingly near the Four Guardsmen, the famous group of giant sequoias that generations of tourists have known as the park’s entrance portal.
The General Sherman, a 2,000-year-old behemoth thought to be the world’s largest tree by volume, fills in the northern finish of the forest.
Crews worked wildly Friday to protect the park’s most famous trees, including the General Sherman, by wrapping their trunks with fireproof foil covers and clearing flammable debris from their bases.
However, authorities couldn’t foresee where the fire — which is as yet zero percent contained — would head straightaway.
“We don’t know precisely what will happen today,” Steven Bekkerus, a public information officer with the firefighting Southern Area Blue Team, said Saturday. “Today might be a functioning fire day.”