The bruised and battered city of Los Angeles remains on high alert as the extreme weather conditions which sparked apocalyptic infernos intensify again and officials ‘do away with’ the term ‘fire season.’
Forecasters warn the most intense threat this week will be on Tuesday morning with wind gusts nearing 70mph fanning the flames of two ongoing fires and complicating the ongoing searches for up to two dozen people missing in evacuation zones.
Firefighters are still battling to get the major blazes under control. They’ve torn through more than 40,000 acres of land, destroyed an estimated 12,300 structures and cost at least 24 people their lives.
The death toll is expected to grow as cadaver dogs gain access to the smoldering wreckages of entire neighborhoods which, Jay Leno noted, simply ‘no longer exist.’
The winter infernos have forced authorities to rethink the way they’ve historically mapped out ‘fire seasons’ throughout the year.
Cal Fire information officer David Acuña said the official body have now ‘done away with the term fire season’ because it simply is no longer accurate.
‘We now refer to it as fire year,’ he said.
Looking to the week ahead, Acuña warned: ‘Anything that is not currently on fire or was not on fire means that it’s a potential start. There’s so much fuel on the ground, and by that, I mean grass and brush.’
Jay Leno compared the disaster on Monday night to the 9/11 attacks, telling CNN: ‘Not that 9/11 was a natural disaster, but it’s literally on that scale.’
‘It’s an entire city wiped out,’ he said.
‘Pacific Palisades – it doesn’t exist and probably won’t exist for the next five, six years.’
The sheer scale of the devastation is unprecedented, with prime real estate stretching from Malibu to the Palisades and down to Santa Monica wiped off the map.
Miles Teller, Mel Gibson and Paris Hilton are among A-list celebrities who lost their homes in the inferno.
The Palisades fire remains just 14 per cent contained, having burned through 23,713 acres.
Among the losses were an estimated 100,000 scores by 20th century composer Arnold Schoenberg.
His 83-year-old son, Larry, said all of the inventory was kept in a building behind his Palisades home.
‘It’s brutal,’ he said. ‘We lost everything.’
Inland at Pasadena and Altadena, the scale of the devastation is measured differently.
The Eaton fire has burned through less land than the Pasadena fire, but the human cost is far greater.
Already, 16 bodies have been found in the carnage. Some 7,000 structures are estimated to be gone, but the process of examining what remains is slow going.
Mandy Moore’s home was among those charred beyond recognition in the Eaton fire, which spans 14,117 acres.
It is just 33 per cent contained.
Los Angeles is already one of America’s lease affordable cities, and now there are 92,000 locals who have found themselves displaced and forbidden from returning home even if their houses did survive the inferno.
It means competition is rife for the shelter beds, hotel rooms and temporary evacuation accommodation which has been set up to house them all.
Authorities estimate they will be able to begin reopening evacuation zones by Thursday morning, after the high intensity ‘life threatening’ wind event forecast over the coming days – and the risk of more fire weather – subsides.
The National Weather Service warned the winds forecast between today and Wednesday evening could lead to ‘explosive fire growth’, but by Thursday the conditions are due to change and give firefighters the upper hand.
The fires continue to burn as:
Locals say the human toll in Altadena and Pasadena could have been far greater if it weren’t for the relentless work of baby-faced weather buff Edgar McGregor.
The 24-year-old Altadena local was sharing updates in his community Facebook page on January 7, hours before several megafires erupted throughout southern California.
He warned his neighbors not to go to sleep, to pack a bag and to be prepared to evacuate in an instant.
Speaking to People, McGregor said it dawned on him a week prior to the fires that the weather event could be ‘cataclysmic,’ and began the arduous task of convincing anybody who would listen.
‘I knew on Dec. 30th that when this windstorm hit, the conditions would be carbon copies of the conditions that were on the ground in Lahaina, Hawaii, and in Paradise, which both were completely leveled and lost around a hundred people each,’ he said.
The dry brush had been piling up for months, and without any rain leading into winter, when McGregor saw the winds in the forecast around New Years Day, he knew the risk was enormous.
‘I told people, if a wildfire breaks out, there’ll be a thousand homes burned down. This would be cataclysmic.’
Now, Democrat Governor Gavin Newsom risks being out of office for his ‘woeful’ response to the LA wildfires.
Newsom, 57, has faced calls to resign for the devastating handling of the catastrophe, with everyone from Donald Trump to Hollywood stars slamming his and Mayor Karen Bass’ lack of leadership.
Saving California, a group that touts itself as a ‘non-partisan coalition of working families, professionals and community advocates’ have launched another recall against Newsom.
A spokesperson for Newsom told Newsweek that the governor is ‘100 percent focused on the fires, ongoing rescue efforts and the recovery process – not politics.’
He sparked fury after claiming he does not know how the Los Angeles wildfires happened – while appearing to cast blame on other officials, including LA mayor Karen Bass.