A fire ripped through a sprawling scrap yard in American Canyon on Sunday afternoon, burning 50 to 100 junked cars and destroying two structures while sending plumes of black smoke into the air that was visible as far away as Oakland.

The blaze started around 3 p.m. and quickly swept through 18 to 20 acres of the scrap yard in the 800 block of Green Island Road, just east of the Napa River, said Scott McLean, a spokesman for Cal Fire