Category Archives: Forest Fires

LOS ANGELES — Wildfires tore across the Los Angeles area with devastating force Wednesday after setting off a desperate escape from burning homes through flames, ferocious winds and towering clouds of smoke. The flames from a fire that broke out Tuesday evening near a nature preserve in the inland foothills northeast of LA spread so rapidly that staff at a senior living center had to push dozens of residents in wheelchairs and hospital beds down the street to a parking lot. …Another blaze that started hours earlier ripped through the city’s Pacific Palisades neighborhood, a hillside area along the coast dotted with celebrity residences… A third wildfire started around 10:30 p.m. and quickly prompted evacuations in Sylmar, a San Fernando Valley community that is the northernmost neighborhood in Los Angeles, and a fourth was reported early Wednesday in Coachella, in Riverside County.

LOS ANGELES – A rapidly growing wildfire raged across an upscale section of Los Angeles on Tuesday, destroying numerous buildings and creating traffic jams as more than 30,000 people evacuated, while a second blaze doubled in size some 30 miles inland. At least 2,921 acres (1,182 hectares) of the Pacific Palisades area between the coastal towns of Santa Monica and Malibu had burned by the Palisades Fire, officials said, after they had already warned of extreme fire danger from powerful winds that arrived following extended dry weather. …The second blaze dubbed the Eaton Fire broke out some 30 miles (50 km) inland near Pasadena and doubled in size to 400 acres (162 hectares) in a few hours, according to Cal Fire. …Los Angeles Fire Chief Kristin Crowley had earlier told a press conference that more than 25,000 people in 10,000 homes were threatened.

In reports released Monday, Jan. 6, the State Fire Marshal’s Office detailed how an Oct. 6 fire that destroyed 30,549 acres, killed two people and traveled between Ray and Tioga started. It was one of two fires that burned nearly 90,000 acres and nearly engulfed the two small cities in northwest North Dakota… The tree hit the power line and broke it in half. The downed lines then ignited dry grass. Photos included in the Fire Marshal’s report showed the broken power lines and impact points on the tree, which reportedly was taller than the power lines… Officials are still determining what started a second fire that started the same day near U.S. Highway 85 about 30 miles north of Williston.