More than 30,000 people evacuated their homes as a forest fire ravaged a coastal area of Los Angeles in a few hours and a second fire, some 50 km inland, spread rapidly on Wednesday.
Many buildings were destroyed and nearly 1,200 acres burned in the upscale Pacific Palisades area, located between the beach towns of Santa Monica and Malibu, according to authorities. This area is home to many film and music stars.
Highways were clogged with people fleeing the blaze as plumes of smoke and flames rose into the Los Angeles sky overnight Tuesday into Wednesday. The fires had not been contained as of Wednesday morning and Governor Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency.
Cindy Festa, a Pacific Palisades resident, said that as she evacuated the scene, the fires were “right up close to the cars,” demonstrating with her thumb and index finger.
“People left their cars on Palisades Drive. The fire is burning the hillside. The palm trees – everything is going away,” Cindy Festa said from her car.
A fire official told local television station KTLA that several people were injured in the Palisades fire, some suffering burns to their faces and hands. A female firefighter suffered a head injury.
Hollywood actor James Woods told X that he was able to evacuate his Pacific Palisades home, but added, “I don’t know right now if our house is still standing.”
The second fire, dubbed the Eaton Fire, started about 30 miles inland at Altadena, near Pasadena, and grew within hours from 200 to 1,000 acres. (400 hectares), according to Cal Fire.
Nearly 100 residents of a Pasadena nursing home have been evacuated, according to CBS News. Videos showed elderly residents, many in wheelchairs or on stretchers, crowded into a smoky, windswept parking lot as fire trucks and ambulances rushed to the scene.
Firefighters said a third fire, called the Hurst Fire, broke out in Sylmar, in the San Fernando Valley, northwest of Los Angeles, prompting the evacuation of some nearby residents.
More than 220,000 homes and businesses in Los Angeles County were without power as of late Tuesday, according to data from PowerOutage.us.
PALISADES FIRE
Witnesses reported that a number of homes were on fire and that flames nearly burned their cars as people fled the hills of Topanga Canyon as the fire spread from there to the Pacific Ocean.
Local media reported that the fire also spread north, burning homes near Malibu. Parts of Malibu and Santa Monica were ordered evacuated.
Several burn victims were treated after walking to Duke’s restaurant in Malibu in the evening, the Los Angeles Times reported, citing a fire official.
Los Angeles Fire Chief Kristin Crowley told a news conference that more than 25,000 people in 10,000 homes were at risk.
Firefighting planes pulled water from the sea to lower it onto the flames that were engulfing homes. Bulldozers cleared roads of abandoned vehicles to allow emergency vehicles to pass, television footage showed.
The fire burned some trees on the grounds of the Getty Villa, a museum rich in priceless works of art, but the collection remained safe largely because nearby bushes had been pruned as a preventative measure, it said. the museum.
Before the fire started, the National Weather Service had issued its maximum alert for extreme fire conditions across much of Los Angeles County from Tuesday through Thursday.
With low humidity and dry vegetation due to a lack of rain, conditions were “about as bad as it gets in terms of fire weather,” the service said.
Governor Newsom said the state has positioned personnel, fire trucks and planes elsewhere in Southern California because of the fire danger facing the entire region.
The powerful winds changed the travel plans of President Joe Biden, who grounded Air Force One in Los Angeles. He had planned to take a short flight inland to the Coachella Valley to attend a ceremony creating two new national monuments in California.
“I have offered whatever federal assistance is needed to help suppress the terrible Pacific Palisades fire,” Joe Biden said in a statement.
A federal grant has already been approved to help reimburse the state of California for fighting the fire, Biden said.
Actor Steve Guttenberg told television station KTLA that friends of his were prevented from evacuating because others abandoned their cars on the road.
“It’s very important that everyone sticks together and doesn’t worry about their personal belongings. Just get out,” Guttenberg said.
“Take your loved ones and go out.
