Monday morning news: July 30, 2018

Deadly fire rages in Northern California » Fire crews are struggling to corral a deadly blaze in Northern California.

Over the weekend that fire claimed three more lives as it doubled in size. Two young children and their great-grandmother are now among five people who have died. The blaze claimed the lives of two firefighters earlier in the week.

California Incident Commander Brett Gouvea said officials are doing everything they can to keep residents out of harm’s way.

GOUVA: Evacuations, as you’ve see, have been brisk and often over the last 24 hours, and they’re still possible. We’re not taking any chances moving forward, as we saw the fire behavior over the last several days. 

President Trump issued an emergency declaration on Saturday, allowing affected counties to access federal aid. The fire started Monday and has displaced roughly 40,000 residents. The blaze wiped out the small community of Keswick, swept through the historic Gold Rush town of Shasta, and hit homes in Redding.

Shasta County Sheriff Tom Bosenko said everyone in the region must be on alert.

BOSENKO: When people receive an evacuation notice that they are prepared and ready to have their belongings, their important paper, artifacts and personal belongings ready to go. 

California fire officials said more than 10-thousand firefighters were working to stop the progress of 14 large wildfires across the state.

Greece death toll reaches 91 » Meanwhile in Greece, fire officials raised the death toll from a wildfire that raged through a coastal area east of Athens to 91. They said another 25 people were still missing after Europe’s deadliest forest fire in more than a century.

Indonesia earthquake » In Indonesia a powerful earthquake has killed at least 14 people and injured more than 160 others. The 6.4 magnitude quake struck Indonesia’s Lombok island on Sunday. That’s a popular tourist destination next to Bali.

The quake struck at a depth of only about four-and-a-half miles. That’s bad news because shallow earthquakes tend to do more damage than deeper ones.

The quake caused widespread blackouts and triggered a large landslide from Mount Rinjani (rin-jawn-ee), which is an active volcano.

Trump threatens shutdown » President Trump said Sunday that he is willing to “shut down [the] government”—his words—“if the Democrats do not give us the votes for Border Security, which includes the [border] wall!”

The president returned to the idea of forcing a partial government shutdown after a meeting last week with GOP leaders to discuss the fall legislative agenda.

But Republicans on Capitol Hill were quick to downplay the idea. Wisconsin Senator Ron Johnson…

JOHNSON: Let’s hope not. I think – hopefully most of the appropriation bills will actually be passed – a little better of prioritization spending. So I certainly don’t like playing shutdown politics. 

The president could trigger a partial shutdown by vetoing an upcoming spending bill. Current funding expires at the end of September. Estimates put the cost of the proposed wall in the tens of billions of dollars.

Cardinal resigns amid sex abuse accusations » Pope Francis has accepted the resignation of Cardinal Theodore McCarrick, the emeritus archbishop of Washington, D.C., following accusations of sexual abuse. The Vatican announced Saturday that Francis ordered McCarrick to a “life of prayer and penance,” even before a church trial is held.

McCarrick, now 88 years old, was one of the most prominent Catholic church officials in the U.S. The church already removed him from public ministry last month, pending an investigation into accusations that he sexually abused a teenager more than 40 years ago in New York City. The accuser says he was 11 when the abuse started and that it continued for more than two decades.

Box Office » AUDIO: Mission Impossible 6 trailer

At the weekend box office, Mission Impossible: Fallout scored a big opening weekend.

AUDIO: How many times has Hunt’s government betrayed him, disavowed him, cast him aside. How long before a man like that has had enough? 

The sixth installment in the franchise hauled in $62 million domestically over the weekend. That made it the biggest Mission Impossible opening ever.

Momma Mia 2 finished in second place with $15 million.  

You can find WORLD’s reviews of current films—along with ratings and content information—at WNG.org/movies.

I’m Kent Covington. Straight ahead: the next in our summer Legal Docket series. And Mary Coleman on acting like a Christian in traffic. This is The World and Everything in It.

(Hector Amezcua/The Sacramento Bee via AP) A Cal Fire firefighter waters down a back burn on Cloverdale Rd., near the town of Igo, Calif., Saturday, July 28, 2018. 

WORLD Radio transcripts are created on a rush deadline. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of WORLD Radio programming is the audio record.