Bush tours N. Calif. wildfire area

REDDING, Calif., July 17 (UPI) -- President George W. Bush visited Northern California Thursday to get a firsthand look at the devastation caused by an early season outbreak of wildfires.

The president and administration officials met with fire commanders and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who called the level of cooperation and assistance from Washington "fantastic."

"Thanks to this great coordination, we have been able to obtain and utilize resources from the federal government, 40 states and a number of international partners," Schwarzenegger said in a written statement. "We face more challenges in the hot and dry summer months ahead ... and I look forward to the president continuing to be our partner in this effort."

More than 887,000 acres of forest have been burned in more than 2,000 wildfires -- most of them sparked by lightning storms -- last month.

Bush took an aerial tour of the Shasta-Trinity National Forest to look over the blackened landscape as well as areas where work has been under way to thin out overgrown brush and small trees.

While en route to California, Under Secretary of Agriculture Mark Rey told reporters on Air Force One that such projects around California had paid off during the current fire emergency.

"What we're going to see ... are areas where we were able to put the fires out because they entered into places where thinning had been done, and they reduced in intensity and allowed our firefighters to attack them directly," Rey said.