At least five dead as overwhelmed firefighters struggle to contain LA

Fast-moving wildfires tore through several neighborhoods of Los Angeles, killing at least five people, incinerating more than 1,100 buildings and leaving firefighters across the region spread thin.

The disaster began on Tuesday afternoon, when a powerful windstorm fanned the flames of a fire in the scenic Pacific Palisades neighborhood, quickly forcing thousands to flee.

The emergency intensified overnight as firefighters struggled to contain the flames in the extreme winds during what one official described as among the “most devastating and terrifying nights” in city history.

By morning, authorities had dispatched crews from across California to help tackle at least four blazes besieging the region, and Oregon reported it would send firefighters.

More than 70,000 people have been ordered to evacuate their homes and more than 13,000 buildings from the affluent neighborhoods on the city’s west side overlooking the Pacific Ocean to the hillside suburbs in the east are under threat. Officials say the flames have injured many, and UCLA said its hospitals had treated over 20 patients.

The LA county fire chief, Anthony Marrone, said on Wednesday morning there were “not enough firefighters in LA county to address four separate fires of this magnitude”. The county was prepared for “one or two brushfires, but not four, especially given these sustained winds and low humidities”, he said.

One of the blazes, the Palisades fire, has been deemed the most destructive in the modern history of Los Angeles and preliminary estimates of damages and economic losses from the disasters exceeded $50bn.

The fires are also straining the region’s water resources. Firefighters battling the blazes have struggled with reduced water pressure and fire hydrants that have run dry in some areas due to the increased demand, the city’s water and power department reported. Officials have urged residents to conserve water.

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In some parts of LA, the flames moved so quickly that residents were forced to abandon their cars and flee on foot, later leading to jammed roads that first responders had to clear with bulldozers. In the Pacific Palisades, Sheriece Wallace said she was unaware there was a fire burning around her until her sister called as a helicopter made a water drop overhead.

“I was like: ‘It’s raining,’” Wallace said. “She’s like: ‘No, it’s not raining. Your neighborhood is on fire. You need to get out.’

“As soon as I opened my door, it was like right there,” she said. “The first thing I did was looked at the trees to see where the wind was blowing. Because it hit me. It blew me back.” She was able to leave.

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The Palisades fire was wholly uncontained as of Wednesday afternoon and prompted evacuation orders for roughly 37,000 residents, extending into some densely populated neighborhoods north of the city’s famous pier.

Other inland wildfires in Los Angeles were also spreading fast, including the major Eaton fire in Altadena, near Pasadena. That blaze exploded in size and has grown to 10,600 acres and was expected to become the largest California wildfire to burn during the month of January in the past 41 years.

As many as 500 structures have been impacted or destroyed, at least five Altadena school campuses have suffered substantial fire damage and roughly 100,000 people have been ordered to evacuate in the Eaton fire.

Two smaller fires were also reported, including the Hurst fire, in Sylmar, in the San Fernando Valley, north-west of Los Angeles, and one that began on Wednesday named the Woodley fire, near the Van Nuys neighborhood. By Wednesday afternoon, a brush fire, called the Lidia fire, had begun burning into the Angeles national forest.

All fires were 0% contained, according to officials from California’s department of forestry and fire protection. A fifth fire to the east of the city, named the Tyler fire, began overnight but was largely contained.

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The fires have consumed a total of about 42 square miles (108 sq km) – nearly the size of the entire city of San Francisco.

The governor of California, Gavin Newsom, has declared a state of emergency. Before daybreak on Wednesday morning, he released a statement saying the state had deployed more than 1,400 firefighting personnel “to combat these unprecedented fires in LA”.

Newsom cancelled plans to attend Jimmy Carter’s funeral because of the disaster. Donald Trump used the fires as an opportunity to criticize Joe Biden andNewsom in a rambling post on Truth Social in which he said the governor was to blame for the disaster because of his policies related to the endangered smelt fish.

Meanwhile, residents in the sprawling suburbs and rural enclaves are bracing for another day of brutal wind. Gusts across the southern California region peaked at 100mph, with swaths of the area seeing between 50-80mph winds over the last two days.

Trees thrashed and debris was strewn across yards in Chatsworth, California, a neighborhood at the foot of the Santa Susana mountains, throughout a sleepless night on Tuesday. Residents anxiously kept watch on the glowing horizons and billowing smoke pluming over the mountains above wondering if new ignitions would start in the night.

Wind-whipped fires are difficult to stop and can move incredibly fast, especially through these parched landscapes.

“It was very surreal,” said Patty Robinson, a resident, after trees thumped against her roof and the gusts howled. “To hear this wind and know the effect it is having and the damage that it can bring makes my hackles rise,” she added. “My little lizard brain is freaking out.”

Displaced residents have sought shelter at local evacuation centers. The city has opened several facilities to take in those escaping the flames, and are providing hot meals and food for dogs and cats. In Pasadena several hundred people, many of whom were elderly and from assisted living facilities, were at an evacuation center on Wednesday afternoon. They sat wheelchair-to-wheelchair.

Donald Fisher, 78, said he was first to be wheeled onto the bus at the Camellia Gardens Care Center to be taken to the shelter around 8am.

“I can stand up but I can’t walk,” Fisher said. “I think that the city of Pasadena did a marvelous job.”

The National Weather Service (NWS) had previously issued its highest alert for extreme fire conditions for much of Los Angeles county until Thursday. Low humidity and dry vegetation due to a lack of rain meant the conditions were “about as bad as it gets in terms of fire weather”, the NWS said.

The service warned the most extreme conditions were expected on Wednesday morning.

Gusts could reach speeds of 100mph (160km/h), the NWS said. The powerful winds have grounded Air Force One in Los Angeles, forcing a change in the travel plans of the president, Joe Biden.

Human-caused climate breakdown is supercharging extreme weather across the world, driving more frequent and more deadly disasters from heatwaves to floods to wildfires.

The region has been experiencing warmer than average temperatures in January, in part due to recent blasts of dry air, including the notorious Santa Ana winds. Southern California has not recorded more than 0.1in (2.5mm) of rain since early May.

Jeff Monford, a power utility spokesperson, said it was not always possible to give advanced notice to customers of power shutoffs, telling the Los Angeles Times: “This is a phenomenon of the increasing effects of climate change on weather. We have more weather extremes that can change more quickly than we might be accustomed to.”

As of Wednesday afternoon, more than 153,000 homes and businesses were suffering power outages, according to PowerOutage.us.

Evacuees described harrowing escapes, including one woman who recounted to ABC7 how she abandoned her vehicle and fled with her cat in her arms. She said: “I’m getting hit with palm leaves on fire … It’s terrifying. It feels like a horror movie. I’m screaming and crying walking down the street.”

The blazes also reached the grounds of the Getty Villa, an art museum by the Malibu coast. Some vegetation on the property burned, but museum officials said no structures had been affected.

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed reporting

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