Uno burning smell in the air. Palm trees on fire. Abandoned cars bulldozed out. And a terrible wind fanning flames that devour dry hills. A violent incident broke out in Pacific Palisades on Tuesday January 7, 2025, threatening west Los Angeles, between Santa Monica and Malibu. The Palisades fire had already destroyed more than 500 hectares Tuesday evening, prompting authorities to order the evacuation of 30,000 people.
The weather service had warned that conditions were particularly dangerous this week, with eight months of drought in Southern California and Santa Ana winds, coming from the desert, which have been blowing for 48 hours with gusts reaching 130 km/h.
Residents trapped in traffic jams
The Palisades fire broke out around 10:30 a.m. as a brush fire with an undetermined origin. Driven by the winds, the flames quickly threatened homes in this upscale area of Los Angeles, including the house of actor James Wood, who was forced to evacuate. An unknown number of homes were destroyed.
Living in the hills comes at a price: these risky areas are often only accessible by single roads that wind through California’s canyons. And in times of disaster, they become bottlenecks, trapping residents trying to evacuate while driving in traffic jams worthy of a disaster movie.
Dozens of people left their vehicles to flee on foot, threatened by new outbreaks of fire, randomly carried by embers carried by the wind, sometimes to reach the ocean below. Authorities used bulldozers to clear abandoned cars and allow fire trucks to pass.
To Discover
Kangaroo of the day
Answer
By the evening, flames reached the ocean and threatened the Getty Villa. Several palm trees along the PCH, the famous highway that runs along the Pacific, were in flames. Miraculously, no casualties have been reported so far.
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