Wind lull offers hope in Los Angeles fires
LOS ANGELES, United States — Winds calmed Friday around Los Angeles, providing a fleeting window of opportunity in a firefighting battle against five major blazes wreaking havoc across the city.
At least 10 people have died as flames ripped through neighborhoods, razing thousands of homes in one of the worst disasters ever to hit California, with one estimate suggesting the bill could hit $150 billion.
As the scale of the damage to America’s second-biggest city started to come into focus, Angelenos grappled with heart-rending ruin.
“I lost everything. My house burned down and I lost everything,” Hester Callul, who reached a shelter after fleeing her Altadena home, told Agence France-Presse.
As fears of looting and crime grow, California Governor Gavin Newsom deployed the National Guard to bolster law enforcement. Los Angeles County Sheriff Robert Luna imposed a nighttime curfew in some areas.
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“This curfew will be strictly enforced and is being taken to enhance public safety, protect property and prevent any burglaries or looting in the area that the residents have evacuated,” he said.
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READ: Los Angeles fires rage on as National Guard called in
Luna said anyone who falls foul of the rule could be jailed.
“We are not screwing around with this,” he said.
The five separate fires have so far burned more than 35,000 acres (14,000 hectares), California’s fire agency reported.
Authorities have said it was too early to know the cause of the blazes.
‘Still very dangerous’
A temporary lull in winds has enabled progress in tackling the fires.
The biggest of the blazes has ripped through more than 20,000 acres of the upscale Pacific Palisades neighborhood, where firefighters said they were starting to get the fire under control.
By Friday eight percent of its perimeter was contained – meaning it can’t spread any further in that direction.
The Eaton fire in the Altadena area was three percent checked, with almost 14,000 acres scorched and key infrastructure – including communication towers – threatened.
A third fire that exploded Thursday afternoon near Calabasas and the wealthy Hidden Hills enclave, home to celebrities like Kim Kardashian, added to the feeling of encirclement.
“You just feel surrounded,” one woman told a local broadcaster.
READ: Whole streets burn as fires rage around Los Angeles
After a massive response to the blaze, including retardant drops from planes and helicopters dumping vast quantities of water, the fire was 35 percent surrounded, firefighters said on Friday.
But federal emergency chiefs warned the situation is “still very dangerous” and the reprieve from intense gusts that spread embers will not last.
“It is still very dynamic. The winds have died down today, but as I just got a weather briefing… the winds are going to increase again in the coming days,” said Deanne Criswell, administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
“The beauty of the wind dying down is that they can get better control over the fires, but it also doesn’t blow the smoke out,” she told a White House briefing.
‘Heartbroken’
Agence France-Presse journalists surveyed the Pacific Palisades and Malibu via helicopter, witnessing mile after mile of obliteration.
“This is crazy… All these homes, gone,” said pilot Albert Azouz.
On highly coveted Malibu oceanfront plots, skeletal frames of buildings indicated the fire’s power, with many multimillion-dollar mansions vanishing entirely.
Socialite and hotel heiress Paris Hilton was among those whose homes were lost.
“Heartbroken beyond words,” she wrote on Instagram.
“Sitting with my family, watching the news, and seeing our home in Malibu burn to the ground on live TV is something no one should ever have to experience.”
The fires could be the costliest ever recorded, with AccuWeather estimating total damage and loss between $135 billion and $150 billion.
Beyond the immediate carnage, the fires disrupted life for millions: schools were closed, hundreds of thousands were without power and major events were canceled or, in the case of an NFL playoff game between the Los Angeles Rams and the Minnesota Vikings, moved.
Meteorologist Mike Woofford of the National Weather Center told AFP winds would lessen Friday and Saturday, offering a vital opportunity to firefighters.
“We’re seeing a little bit of a decrease now, but more so this afternoon dropping off, and then not much wind tomorrow, until later in the day,” he said.
“For sure, good news,” he said, but cautioned it remained dry and winds were expected to return.
Wildfires occur naturally, but scientists say human-caused climate change is altering weather and changing the dynamics of the blazes.
Two wet years in southern California have given way to a very dry one, leaving ample fuel on the ground primed to burn.