Here's what experts say is turning Southern California's speedy wildfires into a deadly urban conflagration that is defying the calendar.

The sports movie, like any genre, can easily fall victim to overly familiar story beats.

Forecasters say the only break much of America can hope for anytime soon from eye-watering dangerous smoke from fire-struck Canada is brief bouts of shirt-soaking sweltering heat and humidity from a southern heat wave that has already proven deadly.

(AP Photo/Noah Berger, File)SAN FRANCISCO – The staggering scale of California's wildfires reached another milestone Monday: A single fire surpassed 1 million acres. Gavin Newsom said the amount of land scorched by the August Complex is larger than all of the recorded fires in California between 1932 and 1999. Since the beginning of the year, more than 8,200 California wildfires have scorched “well over 4 million acres” or 6,250 square miles, the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection said Sunday in a statement. Numerous studies have linked bigger wildfires in America to climate change from the burning of coal, oil and gas. Scientists say climate change has made California much drier, meaning trees and other plants are more flammable.

Deadly wildfires in California have burned more than 4 million acres (6,250 square miles) this year more than double the previous record for the most land burned in a single year in the state. California fire officials said the state hit the astonishing milestone Sunday, Oct. 4, 2020 with about two months remaining in the fire season. “And that number will grow.”So far, in this year’s historic fire season, more than 8,200 California wildfires have killed 31 people and scorched “well over 4 million acres in California” or 6,250 square miles, Cal Fire said Sunday in a statement. The astonishing figure is more than double the 2018 record of 1.67 million burned acres (2,609 square miles) in California. Flannigan, the fire scientist, estimates the area of land burned from wildfires in California has increased fivefold since the 1970s.