This is going to get worse. Extreme winds and dry conditions in Southern California have helped spawn extremely dangerous wildfires in the Pacific Palisades, Pasadena, and San Fernando Valley areas starting on Tuesday and into Wednesday, and the wind gusts up past 80 mph are expected to continue for another day or so.
Mandatory evacuation orders cover tens of thousands of people, and some unknown number of houses and other structures have already burned. More will follow.
“This is going to be devastating, a devastating loss, for all of Los Angeles,” said an L.A. city councilwoman, according to the New York Times.
The first blaze to grow out of control was the Palisades fire, which prompted evacuations and exploded toward 3,000 acres in the course of a few hours. Next was the Eaton Fire, to the northeast of Pasadena, which has burned north of 2,200 acres at last CalFire update. Overnight the Hurst Fire joined in, in the Valley, and is at least 500 acres in size. None of these are anywhere close to contained.
The Los Angeles Fire Department has asked all off-duty personnel to be available, and more firefighters are being sent in from elsewhere. The winds are heading generally south or southwest, meaning smoke from the Palisades fire has largely headed out to sea, but the Eaton Fire is sending extremely hazardous air across the city; aside from the Pasadena area, places like Torrance, San Pedro, and Redondo Beach currently have air that ranks as anywhere from “unhealthy” to “hazardous.” Almost 350,000 customers in California were without power on Wednesday morning, thanks to the wind and fire but also because utilities shut off some areas to help prevent more ignitions.
It is, of course, January. This isn’t generally considered California’s peak wildfire season, but that’s just where we all live now: “seasons” have more or less escaped containment, and the worst hazards nature can throw at us might show up when they aren’t exactly expected.