The Palisades fire can now be seen across Los Angeles’ San Fernando Valley, an unsettling development as officials worried about the fire expanding into neighborhoods in Encino and Brentwood and possibly jumping the 405 freeway into Bel Air.
A flare-up of the fire caused the Palisades fire, now at 21,596 acres, to move to the north and to the east Friday, chewing through the Santa Monica Mountains.
Crews in helicopters were working to fight the fire by dropping water over flames overnight. They were being aided by relatively calm winds. The red flag fire weather warning for Los Angeles County ended earlier Friday.
The fire on Saturday morning was close to Brentwood’s Mandeville Canyon Road, where large, multimillion dollar homes sit. Evacuation orders were in place for large swaths of Brentwood and Encino, including MountainGate Country Club and the Getty Center.
The Getty Center in Brentwood — home to one of Los Angeles’ largest art collections — is complying with Friday evening’s evacuation order and is now closed, with only emergency staff on site, Ali Sivak, a spokeswoman for the J. Paul Getty Trust, said in a statement.
The Getty Center’s last close call with wildfires was in 2019, when the Getty fire threatened the edge of the museum’s campus but did not affect any of its collections. The Getty Villa in Pacific Palisades was threatened earlier this week by the Palisades fire, but escaped largely unscathed.
Other sections of Encino, as well as part of Bel Air, were under an evacuation warning.
Josh Sautter, president of the Encino Neighborhood Council, said the new evacuation orders sent a shock wave of panic through the community. “People were completely freaked out,” he said.
Areas under an evacuation warning include portions of Encino south of Ventura Boulevard, including the Gelson’s supermarket. Encino Hospital Medical Center is across the street from the evacuation warning area.
“Winds are fairly light at this point,” National Weather Service meteorologist Todd Hall said. There could be gusts of up to 30 mph by daybreak Saturday, he said.
Caltrans has closed offramps from the 405 Freeway near the fire, including at Getty Center Drive and Skirball Center Drive.
Weather conditions were vastly improved from earlier this week, when severe winds — with gusts of up to 100 mph — helped fuel the catastrophic Palisades and Eaton fires to burn through Altadena, Pacific Palisades and Pasadena.
At least 11 deaths have been reported and more than 12,000 structures have been damaged or destroyed. The number of fatalities is likely to rise, Sheriff Robert Luna said.
Earlier Friday, the Palisades fire was forming fire whirls, according to video of the fire, according to video from a news helicopter on KCAL-TV.
But the improved weather is expected to deteriorate soon. Gusty Santa Ana winds are expected to return by Saturday night, and a high wind watch was expected to begin at 6 p.m., and forecasters expected to issue wind advisories for at least some of the valleys in Los Angeles and Ventura counties by Sunday morning, as well as along the coast.
“These gusty Santa Ana winds on Saturday will lead to elevated to brief critical fire weather conditions,” the National Weather Service said.
There could be a stronger Santa Ana wind event developing Tuesday into Wednesday, with wind speeds of 40 mph to 60 mph across Los Angeles and Ventura counties, with isolated gusts of 80 mph in the mountains.
But that is expected to be a more typical Santa Ana wind event — nothing like the extraordinary windstorm conditions that whipped up the Palisades and Eaton fires into one of the most destructive in L.A. County’s history.
The winds earlier in the week were highly unusual for L.A. County. Usually, if winds of up to 100 mph hit L.A. County, they’re usually isolated to the mountains.
The windstorm from Tuesday into Wednesday “was very rare because the winds were really widespread and had strong winds — extending not only into the foothill areas, but into the valleys and also into areas not typically impacted during a typical Strong Santa Ana wind event,” said National Weather Service meteorologist Kristan Lund.
For instance, Altadena and the San Gabriel Valley’s foothills are usually “minimally impacted” during Santa Ana winds, Lund said.
Some longer range forecasts suggest there is a chance for some rain later next week, but that it would be probably “on the lighter side,” the weather service said.
Los Angeles has been abnormally dry. Since the water year began Oct. 1, only 0.16 inches of rain have fallen in downtown Los Angeles. That’s only 3% of the rainfall downtown L.A. should have received at this point of the season on average — 4.99 inches.
The Los Angeles County Department of Public Health has declared a local health emergency due to the fires.
“The fires, coupled with strong winds, have severely degraded air quality by releasing hazardous smoke and particulate matter, posing immediate and long-term risks to public health,” the department said in a statement Friday evening.
The declaration prohibits the use of powered leaf blowers or other devices that could stir up ash and particulate matter into the air until further notice.
If you see or smell smoke, you should close windows and doors to keep indoor air clean, public health officials said. If you must go outside for long periods of time, wear an N95 or P100 mask. You should call your doctor or go to urgent care if you experience severe shortness of breath, coughing, wheezing, chest pain, palpitations, nausea or unusual fatigue, and call 911 if the symptoms are life-threatening.
Multiple unauthorized drones flew above the Palisades fire Friday afternoon, forcing firefighting aircraft to leave the area for safety and angering those working on the front lines, authorities said.
These sightings came just a day after a drone collided with — and damaged — a Super Scooper fixed-wing aircraft, grounding the plane for several days of repairs and reducing the number of aircraft available to fight the fire.
Questions are being raised over Los Angeles officials’ handling of the fire disaster, and why water problems left fire hydrants dry and hampered firefighting efforts.
The Times found that a large reservoir in Pacific Palisades that is part of the Los Angeles water supply system was out of commission when the ferocious wildfire hit. Officials said that the Santa Ynez Reservoir had been closed since about February for repairs to its cover, leaving a 117-million-gallon water storage complex empty in the heart of the Palisades for nearly a year.
The revelation comes amid growing questions about why firefighters ran out of water while battling the blazes that began this week. The Times reported that numerous fire hydrants in higher-elevation streets of the Palisades went dry, leaving crews struggling with low water pressure as they combated the flames.
Gov. Gavin Newsom on Friday ordered an independent investigation of the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power over the loss of water pressure and the empty Santa Ynez Reservoir, calling it “deeply troubling.”
Local fire officials acknowledged Wednesday that they were overwhelmed by the power and size of the largest fires burning in Los Angeles County this week and that crews and resources were taxed to the extreme.
Elsewhere, firefighters gained the upper hand on smaller wildfires — showing how, with milder winds, the ability to drop water on flames using aircraft can play a major role in limiting a fire’s spread.
Officials on Friday praised firefighters’ quick action in the Kenneth fire, which started near the western edge of Woodland Hills about 2:30 p.m Thursday, where Victory Boulevard terminates into the rolling hills of the Upper Las Virgenes Canyon Open Space Preserve.
Firefighting helicopters worked swiftly to douse the flames with water. The fire had consumed 1,052 acres of brush as of Friday and was 50% contained, officials said.
A man “attempting to start a fire” Thursday in a West Hills neighborhood that was burning from the Kenneth fire is under investigation in connection with the blaze, according to law enforcement officials and a document reviewed by The Times.
Times staff writers Rebecca Ellis, Hannah Fry, Matt Hamilton, Ian James, Sandra McDonald, Luke Money, James Queally, Nathan Solis, Grace Toohey, and Richard Winton contributed to this report.
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