California wildfires pose risk for future environmental catastrophe
Los Angeles faces unprecedented environmental issues from burnt debris and inevitable mudslides
Slower winds and cooler temperatures on Friday are expected to provide some reprieve for crews battling the Los Angeles area fires as frustrations began to mount for thousands of evacuees who were told to stay away from their homes for at least another week.
Local officials told most evacuees they wouldn’t return home until hazardous materials and search and rescue teams sifted through the ash and rubble. Though dangerous fire weather conditions have eased, officials warned of other potential risks in impacted neighborhoods, including toxic waste and hazardous electricity and gas lines.
These areas are also at risk of landslides, according to Los Angeles County Public Works Director Mark Pestrella, who said hillsides in some damaged areas have become unstable. Officials and residents have expressed concerns over the environmental fallout of the fires due to the lingering toxic ash, debris, and other contaminants.
Firefighters made progress on the fires, which have burned over 40,000 acres. But the National Weather Service cautioned that the colder weather and light winds will be short-lived, as extreme fire weather was forecast to return on Sunday.
At least 12,000 homes, businesses, and other structures have been leveled or damaged, according to Cal Fire. As of Thursday, about 82,400 people are still under evacuation orders while another 90,400 are under evacuation warnings, Los Angeles County Sheriff Robert Luna said.
The natural forces that contribute to California’s wildfires aren’t going to change anytime soon. But that doesn’t mean areas like the Pacific Palisades and Altadena can’t be rebuilt, said Frank Frievalt, director of the Wildland-Urban Interface Fire Institute at California Polytechnic State University.
Frievalt argued that people must avoid “building back in the same places, in the exact same way.” Doing so, he said, will lead to similarly destructive wildfires in the future and the tactics each community takes must be tailored to their needs.
Frievalt sees the push to implement better wildfire building protections as similar to other public health initiatives, including COVID-19 vaccine campaigns and efforts by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety to decrease vehicle deaths.
Implementing such protocols could take decades and, as with a vaccine, a majority of people in wildfire-affected areas will need to apply the methods to decrease the spread of wildfires. But if the policies take hold, they could save lives, he said.
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“We’re the ones in the petri dish, and we’ve got to figure out how to adapt to really a hotter, drier world,” Frievalt said. “If we don’t do that, we’re in peril.”
– Karissa Waddick
Yvonne Garcia forgot to grab Mr. Guacamole. In the rush of evacuating her home last week in Altadena, California, the mother of two didn’t think to pack her 13-year-old daughter’s beloved avocado toast Squishmallow stuffed animal.
She thought the family would return to their home. When Garcia found out it burned to the ground last Tuesday, her daughter’s sadness at the loss of her fluffy companion only compounded the devastation.
“They kept asking, like, ‘Why me? Why us? Why is my stuff gone?” Garcia said of her daughter and 7-year-old son.
She couldn’t believe it when she saw a post on Instagram days later about a group of volunteers offering to find exact replacements for stuffed animals children lost in the fires. Less than 10 minutes after Garcia entered her information into the Google spreadsheet, someone had already reached out and ordered a stand-in for Mr. Guacamole that was on its way to the family’s temporary address, at Garcia’s brother-in-law’s house in San Dimas.
“To think that someone, whether it’s far or close, could think about a child out there that lost absolutely everything, and want to send them something to just make them feel even slightly of home – that meant the world.” Read more here.
– Karissa Waddick
Search and rescue efforts resumed Friday as authorities attempted to recover and identify charred human remains.
As of Thursday, rescuers were searching for 31 people who went missing amid the chaos of the flames. Twenty-four of the missing were from the Eaton Fire, while seven were from the Palisades Fire area.
At least 27 have died in the fires, according to the Los Angeles County Department of Medical Examiner. Seventeen of them died in the Eaton Fire, while another 10 died in the Palisades Fire.
Of the victims killed, only four autopsies have been completed, the medical examiner said in an update Thursday afternoon. Three died from smoke inhalation and burn injuries, while one died from acute myocardial infarction, with a secondary cause of smoke inhalation and thermal burns, records show.
All four deaths were ruled accidental.
Contributing: Brian Day, Victorville Daily Press; Reuters
