More than 600 firefighters in California’s San Bernardino County are still struggling to contain a fire that began on Saturday in El Dorado Ranch Park, near the city of Yuicapa. Over 7,000 acres have been burned and over 3,000 residents evacuated, according to CBS Los Angeles.
And now we know why: yet another gender reveal party stunt gone wrong.
The California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection said in a statement released late Sunday that the fire had been “caused by a smoke generating device, used during a gender reveal party.” The fire began in the park on Saturday morning — presumably where the party was — and quickly spread north up to Yuicapa Ridge, the statement said.
Gender reveal parties sometimes involve the use of explosions or pyrotechnics to create a plume of pink or blue smoke, thus announcing to gathered family and friends what genitals a soon-to-arrive baby has. It’s a bizarre enough trend as it is, one that’s been disowned by its own creator like a disgraced child.
But this is not exactly the first gender reveal stunt to go horribly awry. It’s not the first one to result in an alarming fire. It’s not even the first to burn thousands of acres of land: In April 2017, an Arizona gender reveal party explosion sparked a wildfire that burned just under 47,000 acres.
It feels like every story like this results in widespread pleas to stop the madness. It honestly does not matter what junk your poor infant has even when it’s revealed via something harmless like candy-filled cake or confetti balloons. Setting huge chunks of land on fire and forcing terrified people from their homes so you can make hacky comments about trucks and ballet is so unnecessary it makes Kanye’s presidential run look like a good use of resources.
“CAL Fire reminds the public that with the dry conditions and critical fire weather, it doesn’t take much to start a wildfire,” the San Bernardino unit’s statement said. “Those responsible for starting fires due to negligence or illegal activity can be held financially and criminally responsible.”
Multiple fires are currently raging across California as the state battles a record-smashing major heatwave, its second of the summer. As of midnight Sunday local time, the El Dorado fire is still burning, with only 5 percent contained.