Over night the Palisades Fire expanded to over 3,000 acres. The Santa Ana winds spawned two more wildfires, the Eaton Fire in Altadena that spread into Pasadena home of the Rose Parade and Rose Bowl on January 1st. And the Hurst Fire that started in northern San Fernando Valley and spread into Sylmar. The worst winds were predicted to be between 10 pm yesterday and 5 am this morning. The wind noise got to be too much so I got up.
Yesterday people evacuating the Palisades Fire got stuck in traffic and abandoned their vehicles on PCH and other roads. Authorities ultimately had to bring in bulldozers to clear vehicles that couldn't be moved so emergency vehicles could get through.
As winds nearing 100 mph continue to gust across Southern California, the fight against the Palisades, Eaton and Hurst fires is expected to intensify, David Acuna, a battalion chief and Public Information Officer at Cal Fire told CNN. “We are having new fires pop up as we speak,” Acuna warned, adding that in order for the fires to stop, winds also need to stop.
CNN national correspondent Natasha Chen and her team were wrapping up a long day of reporting on the devastating wildfires racing through the Los Angeles area on Tuesday, as the sun set over the scorched landscape.
But what began as a routine assignment quickly escalated into a dangerous ordeal, as flames threatened homes and prompted the evacuation of thousands of residents. As they drove south, the situation was far worse than what they were prepared for. “Pretty quickly, we realized there were flames on both sides of the highway. Embers were flying over the road. I spotted an emergency vehicle and decided our best bet was to follow that car as closely as possible. If he’s driving, then he probably knows the best way out,” Chen said. What followed was a harrowing ride through flames and dancing embers all around.
With three large wildfires burning across the Los Angeles County district, all at 0% containment, the next six hours will be critical for firefighters, CNN meteorologist Derek Van Dam said. The weather conditions over the next few hours will continue to prove challenging for firefighters, with strong winds causing the fires to spread, according to Van Dam. “We call that an extremely critical, particularly dangerous situation,” he said. “But that level starts to get lowered as we go through the course of the day today, because the winds are anticipated to relax, conditions will change.” It’s essential to keep an eye on the conditions and see how the fires respond, reiterating that it was a “dangerous situation,” Van Dam said.
“I want our viewers to understand just how quickly these fires can spread, it is at a moment’s notice that an ember can travel across a road, across the expanse of a highway, start additional spot fires, and erupt into a raging inferno,” he said.
Burning through five football fields a minute, the Palisades fire has expanded rapidly over the past few hours, destroying homes and prompting evacuation warnings for tens of thousands of people, from Malibu to Santa Monica.
https://www.cnn.com/weather/live-news/l ... index.html
Santa Ana winds shift and spin and are unpredictable.
The Getty Villa and Museum which sits on top of a hill, was threatened but seems safe for now. The villa was built by J Paul Getty in 1974 in the design of a Roman villa. It's been the site of many meetings of world leaders.
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