BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (KGET) -- As Southern California is experiencing its most devastating winter fires in more than four decades, weather experts say both weather and climate are to blame. The weather this week, with historically fast Santa Ana winds, made for a more explosive situation due to increasing climatological drought conditions. KGET Meteorologist Elaina Rusk says the U.S. Drought Monitor was updated this morning to show the "moderate" drought conditions over Los Angeles County to our south have now been upgraded to "severe" drought status. Here in Kern County, most of our south mountains, including Frazier Park and Tehachapi, were upgrade to moderate drought conditions. As we reported last week, the monthly Sierra Snow Survey showed state's Sierra snowpack is above average, but the southern Sierra is still lagging behind, at 75% of average.