In Los Angeles, an impressive fire broke out in the hills posing a “mortal danger”

UNITED STATES – The blue sky has disappeared, giving way to thick black smoke flowing into the ocean. An impressive fire broke out this Tuesday, January 7 in Los Angeles, in the Pacific Palisades district, which borders the Santa Monica Mountains, in the northwest of the city. A state of emergency has been declared in Los Angeles and Ventura counties.

As you can see in the images below and in the photo at the top of the article, the fire is visible from the tourist town of Santa Monica and all the way to downtown Los Angeles. By early afternoon, the fire had already covered more than 1,200 hectares, according to local firefighters. Its spread is facilitated by the violent winds which have been blowing since the start of the day.

According to several witnesses, some homes have already burned in this upscale area, populated with multi-million dollar villas built in the middle of steep canyons. “I’ve seen this on TV before, and I never thought wind could have such an effect on fire”Gary told local channel KTLA. This resident of the neighborhood said he saw “ embers dragged for 100 meters » in the air.

“There was smoke in the distance, and I was assured it wouldn’t come over the hill. (…) Five minutes later, she was coming down the hill. Everyone panicked and went home to evacuate their homes”he detailed.

Hasty evacuations

“Evacuate the Palisades area now.”ordered the city of Los Angeles on X. Many residents followed the order hastily, with just a few belongings and their pets. This caused large traffic jams in the area and some even abandoned their cars to escape, according to images from local media. Bulldozers had to intervene.

30,000 people are affected by the evacuation order. At this time, no casualties have been reported. “We are absolutely not out of the woods”insisted Mr. Newsom, recalling that the gusts will “ reach their peak » tonight, between 10:00 p.m. and 5:00 a.m. More than 250 firefighters are mobilized.

The fire broke out while Los Angeles was being swept by particularly violent gusts: hot Santa Ana winds, typical of the Californian winter, were expected to blow up to 160 km/h, according to the US Weather Services (NWS). ). Enough to spread the flames very quickly and greatly complicate the task of the firefighters, who could find themselves deprived of aerial means in the coming hours.

“Mortal danger”

” ATTENTION !!! A DESTRUCTIVE windstorm posing a DEADLY DANGER is expected from Tuesday afternoon to Wednesday morning over a large part of the region » from Los Angeles, the NWS warned on “It’s going to be a tough night.” in the region, as winds will peak after sunset, warned Daniel Swain, an extreme events specialist at UCLA University.

“This is expected to be the strongest wind event in this region since 2011”he added. But the risk of fire is according to him “ much higher » than at the time. Because after two very rainy years which reinvigorated the vegetation, southern California suffered “ driest start to winter on record ». In other words, anything that has grown back abundantly now acts as fuel for the fire.

These strong winds disrupted President Joe Biden’s visit to California on Tuesday to announce the creation of two “ national monuments »large protected areas in the south of the state.

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