News to Know

A Sunday evening fire smoked in one of San Francisco's most wildfire-prone neighborhoods after a rogue firework detonated near Calhoun Terrace, igniting the precarious brush fire. Despite its urban density, San Francisco’s wildfire risk remains unusually high, with likelihoods of forest fires expected to increase around 50% over the next 30 years due to a combination of urbanization and climate crisis outcomes. That said, true wildfires remain exceedingly rare within the city limits; the vast majority of fires the San Francisco Fire Department (SFFD) responds to annually are structural fires. Sunday night, SFFD snuffed out a wildfire on Calhoun Terrace in the Telegraph Hill area — a rare blaze inside one of SF’s more metropolitan neighborhoods.  The San Francisco Fire Department is ...

Monday morning's M4.2 earthquake in San Ramon is still producing registerable aftershocks as of Tuesday afternoon. More than 4,000 people felt the ground shake beneath them around 7 a.m. Monday morning, after a 4.2 magnitude earthquake struck the East Bay city of San Ramon, according to information published by the United States Geological Survey (USGS). (The earthquake was even strong enough to be felt in eastern parts of San Francisco, most noticeably in the Marina and Embarcadero, two areas infamous for their liquefaction.) Good morning Northern California! Did you feel the magnitude 4.3 earthquake about 2.5 miles southeast of San Ramon at 7:01 am PT. The #ShakeAlert system was activated. See: https://t.co/rj03jGPInq@Cal_OES @CalConservation pic.twitter.com/zpL1OrpKOV — USGS ShakeA...

Low-flying helicopter passes will continue over SF for the next few days as nuclear safety surveys are conducted before Sunday's big football game. San Francisco has a long history of nuclear warfare and radiation. Of the 300 designated host sites for nuclear missiles developed by the United States during the Cold War, twelve of them are in the San Francisco Bay Area. (Most, like the Nike Missile Site in Marin, are decommissioned and remain open for tours.) The San Francisco neighborhoods of Bayview-Hunters Point and Treasure Island are infamous for their radioactive pollutants; the former location made international headlines in late 2024 after elevated levels of radioactive materials were discovered by the U.S. Navy — an observation found ahead of housing development at Hunters Point Sh...

A rogue mountain lion was sighted and documented in San Francisco's Pacific Heights neighborhood, blocks away from Billionaire's Row — a first in San Francisco's recorded history. San Francisco is no stranger to wild things. The City’s official animal is an introduced species; sea lions draw hundreds of thousands of tourists each year to Pier 39; thousands just recently flooded Golden Gate Park to celebrate the iconic life of one albino alligator that called the seven-by-seven home for over 17 years before his untimely passing last month; the COVID-19 pandemic became synonymous with coyote sightings along empty streets. A mountain lion has been spotted in SF, near Lafayette Park. If you see a mountain lion pick up children, keep dogs on leash and back away slowly - do not run. If it ap...