Fires continue to progress in Los Angeles

The multiple fires that have raged in Los Angeles for five days, causing at least eleven deaths, spread on Saturday to areas hitherto spared, in turn targeted by evacuation instructions.

Entire sections of the second largest city in the United States are devastated: more than 12,000 buildings have been destroyed and more than 15,000 hectares have gone up in smoke. A landscape compared by President Joe Biden to a war scene, with bombings.

Despite the massive mobilization of firefighters, the progression of the fire triggered evacuation orders on the eastern flank of the Pacific Palisades sector, in an area where the Getty Center. Built in part with fire-resistant stones, the famous museum houses 125,000 works of art.

The winds which began to weaken on Friday are expected to regain strength from Saturday, according to forecasts from the Federal Natural Disaster Response Agency (FEMA), further pushing back hopes of bringing the disaster under control.

Authorities criticized

Although it is too early to know the origin of the fires, criticism is aimed at the preparation and response of public authorities.

The head of the Los Angeles fire department, Kristin Crowley lamented on the KTTV channel, affiliated with Fox Newsa persistent lack personnel, resources and fundscomments interpreted as targeting local authorities.

But during a press conference on Saturday in the presence of Ms. Crowley, the city’s mayor, Karen Bass, minimized tensions, ensuring that political leaders, emergency and security services were all on the same wavelength.

For his part, Pope Francis said on Saturday saddened by the loss of life and damage and expressed its spiritual closeness to the people affected by this tragedyin a telegram addressed to the Archbishop of Los Angeles.

Faced with looting in disaster-stricken or evacuated areas, a strict curfew, in force between 6 p.m. and 6 a.m., was decreed Friday by the authorities in the Pacific Palisades and Altadena sectors, the most ravaged.

The Democratic governor of the nation’s most populous state, Gavin Newsom, asked Friday a comprehensive independent review city ​​water distribution services.

He described as deeply disturbing the lack of water supply and loss of pressure at fire hydrants at the start of the fires, which contributed to their expansion, emphasizing the need to answers.

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Residents say they are abandoned

The main fire, among four still active, burned more than 8,000 hectares on the Malibu coast and the upscale Pacific Palisades neighborhood. It was under control at midday on Saturday at 11%, according to emergency services.

Among those who saw their homes destroyed was actor Mel Gibson, whose Malibu home was gutted.

Nicole Perri, whose house went up in smoke in Pacific Palisades, told Agence France-Presse that authorities had completely abandoned the inhabitants.

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Prince Harry and his wife Meghan Markle, who broke ties with the British monarchy in 2020 and reside in California, came to comfort victims in the Pasadena district.

Across the megacity, according to orders received, sometimes by mistake, evacuations number in the hundreds of thousands.

Californians are being urged to conserve water as some reservoirs supplying fire hydrants have been emptied by battling the flames.

These fires could be the costliest on record: AccuWeather estimates total damages and losses at $135 billion to $150 billion.

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Donald Trump and fake news

President Biden considered that lots of demagogues exploited disinformation surrounding the disaster.

He did not name names but his Republican successor-elect Donald Trump spread false information on his network Truth Social. He notably claimed that California was running out of water because of Democratic environmental policies that would divert rainwater to protect a useless fish.

The hot, dry Santa Ana winds currently blowing are a classic of California autumns and winters. But this time they reached an intensity not seen since 2011, according to meteorologists.

A nightmare for firefighters: California is coming out of two very rainy years which gave rise to lush vegetation, now dried up by a glaring lack of precipitation for eight months.

Scientists regularly point out that climate change is increasing the frequency of extreme weather events.