the essential
Amid the piles of ash that now form the backdrop to part of Malibu, along the Pacific Coast Highway, a three-story house remains intact. A “miracle” for its owner, the American producer David Steiner, who notes with desolation the fate reserved for his neighbors.
The terrible fires which ravaged part of Los Angeles have, at first glance, spared no construction in their path. The affected neighborhoods were thus razed as a single block. Destructions were all the more rapid and total as the homes were essentially built with wood as the main material.
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But in Malibu, along the Pacific Coast Highway, this wide road which runs along the beach on which luxurious villas faced the Pacific Ocean, a building stands out today in the middle of the rubble. It rises over three floors and belongs to a certain David Steiner, a very rich 64-year-old retiree who made his fortune in waste management. Living in Texas, he was not in Malibu when the fires broke out.
Who’s credit, architect or contractor?
David Steiner’s $9M Malibu mansion miraculously survived #LAFire due to its sturdy design & construction! Built with stucco, stone & fireproof roof, this duo will surely get a lot of jobs after this.#lafires pic.twitter.com/r8ElAWQISR
— T a y e ud83cudf0d (@tyolajide) https://twitter.com/tyolajide/status/1878371223467401643?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
But from afar, he followed the evolution of the situation, and his hopes of seeing his second home intact after the passage of the fires were tiny when he received, on January 7, a video on which we saw his house surrounded by the flames which devoured the villas of his neighbors. Against all expectations, however, this was not the case.
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A week after the fire, ashes surrounded the villa estimated at $9 million, but it remained standing. Built to survive earthquakes, erected on foundations that plunge 15 meters deep to resist waves, the stone building did not burn. “It’s stucco and stone with a fireproof roof,” David Steiner told New York Post. A construction that is much more likely to resist fires.
AFP – CECILIA SANCHEZ
Despite everything, the rich retiree considers it “a miracle” that his house was not destroyed. “It seemed like nothing could have survived this,” he told the American newspaper, nevertheless confiding that he never imagined that a fire could be so powerful that it would cross the Pacific Coast Highway.
“I’m amazed that my house is still standing,” added David Steiner, who maintains measured joy after the tragedy that struck all his neighbors. The fire was “devastating, there is nothing left”.
