A fast-moving wildfire broke out Tuesday in the inland foothills northeast of Los Angeles hours after another fire ravaged the Pacific Palisades neighborhood along the coast, destroying many homes and prompting emergency orders. evacuation for tens of thousands of people.
The Eaton Fire in Altadena broke out near a nature preserve shortly before 6:30 p.m. local time. The flames spread so quickly that staff at a senior care center had to push dozens of residents in wheelchairs and hospital beds down the street to a parking lot where they waited, dressed in their sheets, as ambulances and other vehicles take them to safety.
To the west, the Pacific Palisades fire that broke out Tuesday morning grew out of control into the night.
The Los Angeles Fire Department called for off-duty firefighters to help battle flames pushed by winds topping 60 mph in some places and creating chaotic scenes as residents fled.
It was too windy for firefighting planes to fly, hampering the fight.
The Pacific Palisades fire ravaged a Los Angeles hillside dotted with celebrity homes on Tuesday, burning homes and triggering evacuation orders. In the frantic rush to safety, roads were blocked and dozens of people abandoned their vehicles and fled on foot, some with their suitcases.
Traffic jams on Palisades Drive prevented emergency vehicles from getting through and a bulldozer was brought in to push abandoned cars aside and create a path, according to the Los Angeles Fire Department.
California Governor Gavin Newsom, who was in Southern California to attend President Joe Biden’s dedication of a national monument, took a detour through the canyon to see “first-hand the impact of these swirling winds and embers,” and he said he found “not a few – many structures already destroyed.” »
Officials did not give the exact number of structures damaged or destroyed in the Pacific Palisades fire, but they said about 30,000 residents were under evacuation orders and more than 13,000 structures were threatened.
And the worst could be yet to come. The fire started here late morning local time, shortly after the start of a windstorm in Santa Ana that the National Weather Service said could be “life-threatening” and the strongest to hit the Southern California for over a decade. The exact cause of the fire is unknown and no injuries were reported, authorities said.
Just 25 miles northeast, in Altadena, the Eaton Fire was burning.
Winds are expected to increase overnight and persist for several days, producing isolated gusts of up to 100 mph in the mountains and foothills, including areas that haven’t seen significant rain in months.
“We are by no means out of the woods,” residents warned, noting that strong winds were expected to persist through the night. He declared a state of emergency on Tuesday.
Tuesday evening, 28,300 homes were without electricity due to violent winds, according to the town hall. About 15,000 utility customers in Southern California had their power cut to reduce the risk of their equipment sparking a fire. In total, half a million customers were at risk of losing electricity preventively.
The Pacific Palisades Fire quickly consumed approximately 11.6 square kilometers of land in the Pacific Palisades neighborhood of west Los Angeles, causing a spectacular plume of smoke visible throughout the city. Residents of Venice Beach, about 10 kilometers away, reported seeing the flames. This is one of several fires that have ravaged the region.
Sections of Interstate 10 and the scenic Pacific Coast Highway were closed to all non-essential traffic to facilitate evacuation efforts. But other roads were blocked. Some residents jumped out of their vehicles to get out of harm’s way and waited to be picked up.
Resident Kelsey Trainor said the only road in and out of her neighborhood was completely blocked. Ash fell all around them while fires burned on both sides of the road.
“We looked across the road and the fire had spread from one side of the road to the other,” Trainor said. “People were getting out of cars with their dogs and their babies and their bags, they were crying and screaming. The road was blocked, completely blocked, for an hour.
An Associated Press video reporter saw the roof and chimney of a house burning and another residence with walls burning. The Pacific Palisades neighborhood, which borders Malibu about 20 miles west of downtown Los Angeles, features hillside streets populated with houses packed tightly together along winding roads nestled against the Santa Monica Mountains and s ‘extends to beaches along the Pacific Ocean.
An AP photographer saw multimillion-dollar homes on fire as helicopters dropped loads of water overhead. Roads were blocked in both directions as evacuees fled toward the Pacific Coast Highway while others begged to be taken home to save their pets. Two of the burning homes were in exclusive gated communities.
Will Adams, a longtime Palisades resident, said he immediately went to pick up his two children from St. Matthews Parish School when he learned the fire was nearby. During that time, he said embers flew into his wife’s car as she tried to evacuate.
“She got out of her car and left it running,” Adams said. She and many other residents walked toward the ocean until they were safe.
Adams said he’s never seen anything like it in the 56 years he’s lived there. He saw the sky turn brown and then black as houses began to burn. He could hear loud noises and bangs “like little explosions”, which he thought were the transformers exploding.
“It’s crazy, they’re everywhere, in every nook and cranny of the Palisades. One house is safe, the other is on fire,” Adams said.
Actor James Woods posted images of flames burning through bushes and palm trees on a hillside near his home. The towering orange flames floated in the landscaped gardens between the houses.
“Standing in my driveway, getting ready to evacuate,” Woods said in the short video on X.
Actor Steve Guttenberg, who lives in Pacific Palisades, urged people who abandoned their cars to leave their keys behind so they could be moved to make way for fire trucks.
“It’s not a parking lot,” Guttenberg told KTLA. “I have friends there and they can’t evacuate. …I walk up there as far as I can moving the cars.
The erratic weather caused Biden to cancel plans to travel to inland Riverside County, where he was expected to announce the creation of two new national monuments in the state. He stayed in Los Angeles, where smoke was visible from his hotel, and was informed of the wildfires. The Federal Emergency Management Agency has approved a grant to help reimburse California for firefighting costs.
Biden said in a statement that he and his team were communicating with state and local officials and that he had offered “all federal assistance necessary to help put out the terrible Pacific Palisades fire.”
Some trees and vegetation on the grounds of the Getty Villa were burned Tuesday evening, but the museum’s staff and collection remain safe, Getty President Katherine Fleming said in a statement. The museum located on the eastern edge of the Pacific Palisades is a separate campus from the famous Getty Museum which focuses on the art and culture of ancient Greece and Rome. The fire also burned classrooms at Palisades Charter High School.
Movie studios canceled two movie previews because of the fire and wind, and the Los Angeles Unified School District said it had temporarily transferred students from three campuses in the Pacific Palisades area.
Recent dry winds, including the notorious Santa Anas, have contributed to warmer than average temperatures in Southern California, where there has been very little rain so far this season. Southern California hasn’t received more than 0.25 centimeters of rain since early May.
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