Firefighters are waging an all-out offensive to prevent the largest deadly wildfire threatening Los Angeles from spreading to one of the city’s most exclusive neighborhoods.
Aerial crews bombarded the burning hillsides with water and fire retardants to contain the Palisades fire, which has grown to another 1,000 acres and now threatens Brentwood.
Officials remained on the defensive amid growing anger over the way fire hydrants dried up as firefighters struggled to contain the fast-moving blazes.
The winds are expected to pick up again overnight, further fanning the flames that have already started. at least 16 people died.
Getty ImagesOn Saturday evening, the Los Angeles County Coroner’s Office announced that 11 of the deaths were attributed to the Eaton Fire and five to the Palisades Fire.
“Los Angeles County experienced another night of unimaginable terror and grief,” Los Angeles County Supervisor Lindsey Horvath said Saturday.
Firefighters have made modest progress against the worst of the infernos, the Palisades Fire, which has burned nearly 23,000 acres and is 11% contained.
But the fire spread to the Mandeville Canyon neighborhood, triggering evacuation orders for swaths of Brentwood, an upscale enclave where Arnold Schwarzenegger, Disney CEO Bob Iger and NBA star LeBron James houses.
The hilltop Getty Center is also home to more than 125,000 works of art, including masterpieces by Van Gogh, Rembrandt, Rubens, Monet and Degas. The building is not damaged so far.
The second largest fire, the Eaton Fire, razed more than 14,000 acres and was 15% contained. Firefighters have mostly contained two smaller fires, the Kenneth and Hurst fires.
But the National Weather Service warned that the gusty Santa Ana winds that fanned the fires early would increase again Saturday and Sunday.
Seven neighboring states, the federal government, Canada and Mexico have flowed resources to California.
No cause has yet been established for these fires. The two largest projects combined razed an area more than twice the size of Manhattan.
Some 153,000 residents are under mandatory evacuation orders and another 166,000 have been warned that they too may have to flee.
The political repercussions began.
On Friday, Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat with suspected White House aspirations, ordered an investigation into why a key reservoir was out of service and some fire hydrants were dry.
Los Angeles Fire Chief Kristin Crowley complained about the shortage.
“When a firefighter approaches a fire hydrant, we expect there to be water,” she said.
Chief Crowley also attacked city leaders for cutting her department’s budget and eliminating mechanic positions, which she said resulted in more than 100 fire apparatus being taken out of service.
On Saturday, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass, who was criticized for attending the inauguration of the African country’s president in Ghana when fires broke out in Los Angeles on Tuesday, hinted at her tensions with Chief Crowley .
“Let me be clear about something,” Bass said at a news conference, “the fire chief and I are focused on fighting these fires and saving lives, and any dispute that we could have will be settled privately.”
More than 70,000 people have signed a petition on change.org demanding the mayor’s immediate resignation.
As fears of looting grow, a sunset-to-dawn curfew is strictly enforced in evacuated areas, an official said.
Newsom announced Saturday that he would double the number of National Guardsmen on the ground to “keep communities safe,” deploying 1,680 troops.
Around twenty arrests were made, notably for burglaries, looting and curfew violations.
Los Angeles County Sheriff Robert Luna said cadaver dogs were helping 40 search and rescue teams navigate razed neighborhoods.
The death toll is expected to rise once door-to-door searches are carried out.
The fires were so intense that the alloys in the car wheels melted into pools of liquid metal.
Rick McGeagh, a real estate agent, told the Reuters news agency that in his Pacific Palisades neighborhood, only six out of 60 houses survived.
In his house, only a statue of the Virgin Mary remained.
“Everything else is ashes and rubble,” said the 61-year-old father of three.
