Officials warn against fake GoFundMe, price gouging and insurance scams
Officials speak from the podium, warning those creating fake GoFundMe’s, hotels from price gouging beyond the 10% maximum, and insurance scams.
Officials said billions of dollars are expected to flow into Los Angeles over the next months and years as a result of the fires, and they will monitor those trying to exploit this as an opportunity.
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24 people have perished as a result of the fires, and the death toll is expected to rise. Luna said 21 deaths have been confirmed in Los Angeles county – 16 in the Eaton and 5 in the Palisades area.
23 people are reported actively missing. 17 in the Eaton area and 6 in the Malibu area. All are adults.
LA official says searchers finding human remains and asks for patience as 92,000 under evacuation order
LA County Sheriff Robert Luna noted the importance of repopulation efforts, but right now approximately 92,000 people in Los Angles county are under evacuation orders while another 89,000 are under evacuation warnings.
“We have people literally looking for the remains of your neighbors,” Luna said. “Please be patient with us.”
Overnight, several more arrests were made now totalling 34 – 30 in the Eaton area and 4 in the Palisades areas. Of these:
2 were for curfew violation
2 were arrested for a drone incident
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LA fire chief says 'we are not in the clear'
LAFD fire chief Kristin Crowley said: “We are not in the clear as of yet. We must not let our guard down.”
“Our thoughts, our hearts, our prayers, go out to you,” Crowley said. She added “we will continue to work very, very, very hard for everyone.”
Crowley, who publicly criticized the city on Friday for budget cuts that she said have made it harder for firefighters to do their jobs, now says the Los Angeles city fire department has maximized our resource capabilities and our response capabilities.”
“Crews up and down the state, mopping up flare ups and hot spots.”
Some stats from the briefing:
The Eaton fire has burned 14,117 acres, with 33% containment. No acreage was gained, “which is a very good thing.” 3,4008 firefighting personnel is dedicated to the incident.
The Palisades fire has burned 23,700 acres, with 14% containment. 5,123 personnel are assigned to this incident.
The Hurst fire has burned 799 acres with 95% containment.
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Los Angeles officials are now holding a press briefing to update the public on the historic California fires.
Firefighting efforts are 'exhausting' as many work multiple days straight
Calfire state fire marshal chief Daniel Berlant said the firefighting efforts since the fires broke out last Tuesday have been “exhausting.”
Some firefighters who were working two days straight were woken up to get back to work, Berlant said.
Berlant said relief efforts include bringing in firefighters from neighboring states, as well as activating the national guard and other resources like black hawk helicopters.
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Have you been affected by the California fires? Tell us how this will impact you financially going forward: whether you have to rebuild your lost home or business in the city, are in search of a new home elsewhere, or face any other financial repercussions, we’d like to hear about it.
The Eaton fire, which covers much of PUSD, is still only 33% contained as of 5:59 this morning, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.
Many evacuation orders and warnings remain in place.
“Our community is strong, resourceful, and resilient,” PUSD superintendent Elizabeth Blanco said. “We will rebuild and honor the beauty and shared history of our schools and neighborhoods while incorporating modern enhancements. We will build a future that reflects the strength and spirit of our community and demonstrates the Power of Us.”
By contrast, the nearby Pasadena Unified School District will remain closed until 17 January “after careful assessment and consultation with local emergency management officials.”
In a statement, the district said: “The Eaton Fire has brought unimaginable losses to our students, families, and staff. Our hearts are with everyone affected by this tragedy.
The health and safety of our PUSD community remain our highest priority as we navigate the significant impact of the fire on so many of our students, families, and staff. Nearly half of our employees reside within the evacuation zone. Many of them, like so many of our students and families, have lost their homes.”
Despite the devastation caused by the ongoing fires, some schools in the region are expected to reopen shortly.
Los Angeles Unified School District – the country’s second largest school district – announced most schools and offices will reopen Monday morning. More than half a million students were out of school as a result of the fires.
Missing school causes concern for a number reasons, but especially because many students rely on it for meals. LAUSD provided two meals per student, per day since the fires broke out.
Los Angeles county fire chief Anthony Marrone just said in an interview with CBS that he does believe there are enough resources to fight the wildfires in the area, contradicting Los Angeles fire department chief Kristin Crowley, who publicly criticized the city on Friday for budget cuts that she said have made it harder for firefighters to do their jobs.
Marrone said these fires are “unprecedented.”
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Almost 50,000 customers remain without power in California.
As of 8:45 am ET, 49, 638 customers in California were experiencing power outages, according to PowerOutage.us.
The Los Angeles Fire Department says that trying to manage donations at their fire stations is impacting their operations and is encouraging people to send all donations to donation centers and nonprofits instead.
In a statement, the Los Angeles Fire Department said:
First and foremost, we want to express our heartfelt gratitude for your generosity and unwavering support. Your donations have made a significant difference in helping us fight these multiple fires affecting our communities.
While the City of Los Angeles and the Los Angeles Fire Department are more than grateful for your support, please do not drop off donations at fire stations or shelters as it impacts the critical operations of these frontline responders.
The department is urging people to instead send items to donation centers and nonprofits.
The South Coast Air Quality Management District has extended a windblown dust advisory due to strong Santa Ana winds through Tuesday afternoon.
The South Coast Air Quality Management District is the air pollution control agency responsible for Orange County and the urban areas of Los Angeles, Riverside, and San Bernardino counties.
The agency said that high winds could disperse ash from the fires and burned structures, potentially leading to Air Quality Index levels that are “Unhealthy for Sensitive Groups or worse” in most of Los Angeles, Orange, and Riverside Counties in the South Coast Air Basin and the Coachella Valley.
The agency also warns that windblown ash from these burned structures may contain elevated levels of air toxins.
“If you see windblown ash, take precautions to reduce exposure” the agency said.
'Particularly dangerous situation' warning issued for Ventura and LA counties
The National Weather Service has issued a “Particularly dangerous situation” red flag warning for Ventura and Los Angeles counties from Tuesday morning until noon on Wednesday.
These warnings have been issued in response to expected damaging gusty winds and low humidity in the area, with gusts predicted to reach between 45 mph and 70 mph.
The National Weather Service stated, “Peak winds for this next event will be weaker than those last week. Nevertheless, winds will be strong enough to potentially cause explosive fire growth.”
A Red Flag Warning indicaes that critical fire weather conditions are either occurring now, or will occur shortly.
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Summary
The time is nearly 5am in Los Angeles, 8am in New York and 1pm in London. Here is the latest on the wildfires situation affecting LA.
Firefighters are preparing for a return of dangerous winds that could again stoke the wildfires.
The National Weather Service has issued a rare warning of a “particularly dangerous situation,” beginning overnight Monday into Tuesday. The service’s Ariel Cohen warned of the risk of “explosive fire growth as those winds pick back up”.
At least 24 people have been killed and thousands of homes have been destroyed in the Los Angeles area.
At least 16 people are still missing and rescue crews are using sniffer dogs to search the debris of burned down buildings. Authorities are expecting the death toll to rise.
Fire crews made some progress tackling the flames this weekend meaning a limited number of people were allowed to return to previously evacuated areas.
The Palisades Fire is 13% contained and has burned through more than 23,000 acres, according to an update from the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. The Eaton Fire is 27% contained and has burned through over 14,000 acres. The Hurst Fire is 89% contained and has burned through 799 acres.
Los Angeles District Attorney Nathan Hochman is expected to announce charges against a group of people accused of looting houses and in the Pacific Palisades at a news conference on Monday afternoon.
I’m handing over this blog to my colleague Anna Betts now, thank you for reading.
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Power companies in Los Angeles are working to prevent potential damage to power lines by clearing dry shrubbery and vegetation from the areas surrounding power poles.
Once cleared, the companies are then dousing power poles with fire retardent similar to that being dropped by firefighting aircraft.
“We are way ahead from the fire,” Connor Norton, a PG&E employee working in North Hollywood told CBS News on Sunday.
Most Los Angeles schools and offices outside those areas still affected by fires will reopen today, the Los Angeles Unified School District has said.
“Conditions have improved for a majority of areas across the Los Angeles region and the district is confident it is safe for students and employees to return to campuses,” it said.
Firefighters from Mexico and Canada are being deployed to California to help the efforts to contain the Los Angeles wildfires.
More than 70 firefighters from Mexico received training on Sunday and have been practising under the guidance of California teams.
“It’s extremely important to have the help from our neighbors,” Curtis Rhodes, Cal Fire public information officer, told NBC. “Not only do we have México down here, we have the Canada firefighters coming in here today.”
Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the Ukraine president, has offered California 150 firefighters in response to a post on X by Donald Trump Jr.
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Los Angeles District Attorney Nathan Hochman is expected to announce charges against a group of people accused of looting houses and in the Pacific Palisades at a news conference on Monday afternoon, US media is reporting.
California governor Gavin Newsom has accused Elon Musk of “encouraging looting” after the billionaire shared posts on his social media platform X that claimed the politician had “decriminalised” it.
The Palisades Fire is 13% contained and has burned through more than 23,000 acres, according to an update from the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.
The Eaton Fire is 27% contained and has burned through over 14,000 acres.
The Hurst Fire is 89% contained and has burned through 799 acres.
LA's dry season expected to worsen in coming weeks
Weather forecasters are predicting that the dry season in Los Angeles is likely to get worse in the coming weeks and that the drought which intensified last week across southern California will continue to worsen into March.
Meteorologist Eric Holthaus has written for the Guardian and says the rain forecast for the next three weeks in Los Angeles means the city’s record-dry start to its rainy season will keep getting worse.
This year’s rainy season is running at just 2% of normal for Los Angeles, which has only seen 0.16in of rain so far.
Weather models increasingly indicate that southern California will receive no rain at all during the rest of January, and potentially no rain during the first week or two of February as well.
That’s really unusual. January and February are the wettest months of the year for Los Angeles, averaging more than 7in of the city’s 13in of rain in a typical year. Even in the winter of 2006-2007, LA’s driest year in history, the city still received a little more than 3in of rain.
Intensifying drought conditions mean that the current round of extremely out-of-season fire weather will continue with the resurgence of any moderate-to-strong Santa Ana winds.
There are emerging signs in longer-range weather models that the current weather pattern could get sticky – and settle into what’s called a blocking pattern. If a blocking pattern, specifically a “Rex block” sets up, it would continue to shunt Pacific moisture either north into Alaska or further south into Mexico, worsening California’s drought.
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The Getty Museum is “confident” its art collections will be protected after fears winds could fan flames towards it and put world-famous works, including Vincent Van Gogh’s Irises, at risk.
President and chief executive of the J Paul Getty Trust Katherine Fleming told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “We try to be super-responsible stewards of global cultural heritage, and don’t take at all lightly the fact that we’re holding all of these treasures.
“And consequently our facility was built to withstand the various things that this region tends to throw our way, earthquakes and forest fires or brush fires among them. So, yes, we’re certainly not cavalier or cocky, but we are confident.”
Opened in 1997, the Getty Centre hails itself as a “marvel of anti-fire engineering”, with its exterior walls made of travertine and the building reinforced with concrete on the inside, PA Media reports. Fleming said the building also has “very sophisticated air circulation systems” because the main concern is smoke damaging the collection, and sections of the gallery can be isolated if one was to be breached.
Images from the picture agencies have been flooding into wires services across the weekend. Here is a selection:
Los Angeles residents have been speaking to the Guardian’s Kate Mishkin in Brentwood. One, Barbara Fishman, said:
How do you decide what to take after you’ve lived in a house for 28 years and you have all kinds of things that you love and you have to take, you know, suitcases of shit? You just decide, I’ll take this sweatshirt, leave this one. I wear these shoes, I’ll lose those, whatever. I mean, the reality of it doesn’t set in until God forbid, like some of those people, they lost their houses.”
Another, Aaron McNeil, was evacuated with his wife and two kids to a Culver City hotel. On Sunday afternoon, he was allowed to return to his home for more belongings.
We have no idea when they’re going to lift the evacuation. So just since we’re at least allowed in right now … we just grabbed a few more essential stuff. We got our fingers crossed that the winds that are coming tomorrow and through Wednesday, I think, don’t whip it back up to what it was.
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On Sunday, LA city Fire Chief Kristin Crowley urged people to stay away from scorched neighborhoods.
“There are still active fires that are burning within the Palisades area, making it extremely, extremely dangerous for the public,” Crowley said during a Sunday morning briefing. “There’s no power, there’s no water, there’s broken gas lines, and we have unstable structures.”
Officials have warned the ash can contain lead, arsenic, asbestos and other harmful materials.
We would like to hear from people in the US about the impact of wildfires in and around Los Angeles. Have you been affected by the recent fires? How are you coping? We would like to hear about your experiences.
Though we’d like to hear from you, your safety and security are most important. When recording or sharing your content with us, please put your welfare and the welfare of others first. Extreme weather events can be very unpredictable and carry very real risks.
If safe, please get in touch here.
After the death toll from the LA wildfires rose to 24 over the weekend, authorities predicted it was likely to rise as sniffer dogs conducted systematic searches in neighborhoods flattened by fire.
Eight deaths have been attributed to the Palisades Fire and 16 to the Eaton Fire, according to the Los Angeles County coroner’s office.
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70 additional water trucks arrive in LA before expected wind event
The Los Angeles County Fire Chief Anthony C. Marrone has said 70 additional water trucks have arrived to help firefighters fend off flames spread by renewed gusts. “We are prepared for the upcoming wind event,” Marrone said.
Fire retardant dropped by aircraft will act as a barrier along hillsides, officials said.
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Firefighters braced for 'explosive fire growth' amid red flag weather warning and new forecast of strong winds
Firefighters across Los Angeles County are bracing for powerful winds to return that could threaten new areas and block efforts to contain existing blazes.
“There will be the potential — especially late Monday night through Wednesday — for explosive fire growth as those winds pick back up,” said the National Weather Service’s Ariel Cohen. “In the case of an evacuation order being issued, you have to follow that immediately. Seconds could save your life.”
The US National Weather Service has issued red flag warnings for severe fire conditions through Wednesday, with sustained winds of 50 mph (80 kph) and gusts in the mountains reaching 70 mph (113 kph).
The most dangerous day will be Tuesday, warned fire behavior analyst Dennis Burns at a community meeting Sunday night. “It will kind of ebb and flow over the next couple days,” Burns said. “Tomorrow night, it will really ramp up.”
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Death toll in California rises to 24 as firefighters brace for more life-threatening winds
Hello and welcome to our live coverage of the devastating wildfires that continue to rage in southern California, killing at 24 people people and displacing up to 100,000 from their homes.
The fires, which are burning through an area larger than the area of San Francisco have destroyed thousands of homes, and reduced entire neighbourhood to ash.
Here is the latest on what California governor Gavin Newsom says could be the “most devastating natural disaster in US history”.
Firefighters are focusing on two of the worst fires in the county: the Palisades fire, which is 11% contained, and the Eaton Fire, which is 27% contained, according to Cal Fire, California’s department of forestry and fire prevention.
Firefighters have had some success over the weekend, with the Hurst fire now 89% contained having destroyed 799 acres, while a fourth fire, Kenneth, burning just over 1,000 acres before it was brought under control early on Sunday.
However, officials have warned that the Santa Ana winds could return, with Cal Fire, warning of “critical fire weather” through to Wednesday. In a post on BlueSky, CalFire said: “Life-threatening winds and dangerously low humidity are forecast for much of southern California – from Ventura to San Diego – creating a significant risk of rapid fire spread. The winds will cause increased fire activity.”
The death toll has risen to 24, according to the Los Angeles medical examiner, although officials acknowledge it is certain to rise. At least another 16 people are missing, according to Los Angeles county sheriff Robert Luna, who said search and rescue efforts were ongoing.
California governor Gavin Newsom said he will suspend a number of environmental laws to allow rebuilding across southern areas of the state destroyed by the wildfires. He said more than 50 teams of inspectors had been assigned to evaluate the damage, and hoped to complete the work in two weeks.
At least 20 arrests have been made for looting. Among them were two burglars who posed as firefighters when entering houses, according to the police.
Rob Bonta, the attorney general of California, has warned against scammers attempting to prey on victims amid the wildfires. Speaking at a press conference, Bonta said: “[In] emergencies like this, in addition to bringing out the best in so many, [it] also brings out bad actors who seek to use the trauma, the chaos of moments like this for their own gain.”
Schools, except some in mandatory evacuation zones, will reopen on Monday, after closing for all 429,000 students in the Los Angeles unified school district on Thursday and Friday, Superintendent Alberto Carvalho announced. Even still, tens of thousands of people forced from their homes by the enormous fires raking will not be able to return for at least four days, officials said on Sunday.
