Seven months before fire swept through the Pacific Palisades neighborhood of Los Angeles, the city’s water managers were formulating a plan to revive an old reservoir to temporarily boost the area’s limited water capacity.
The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power was exploring the option because the neighborhood’s main reservoir — the Santa Ynez Reservoir — had been taken offline as a result of a torn cover, which officials had begun preparations to repair early in 2024. The repair project was still months away from completion this January when the fire broke out, and with the reservoir empty, firefighters ran short of water in fighting the blaze.
Emails released to The New York Times under public records law show that the city had searched for solutions to rectify the monthslong supply shortage but, despite lengthy discussions and preliminary preparations, failed to correct the problem in time.
In early June 2024, crews spent several days cleaning the Pacific Palisades Reservoir, a facility about three miles away from the larger Santa Ynez site that had been retired in 2013. The work, officials wrote, was “in preparation for temporarily placing the Pacific Palisades Reservoir back into service while the Santa Ynez Reservoir is out of service.”
After the cleaning was completed, the crews planned more work, including disinfection of the area and installation of new pipes.
But the plan to bring the old reservoir back online was never completed. Ellen Cheng, a spokeswoman for the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, said in an email on Friday that the city ultimately determined that bringing the reservoir back online could have posed a risk to workers and residents of nearby homes because of structural and other safety issues.
By the time the fire started in early January, the Pacific Palisades Reservoir remained out of service and the Santa Ynez Reservoir was still two months away from being operable.
The inability to bring either reservoir back online seriously undermined the potential water supply in the area. The Santa Ynez Reservoir could hold tens of millions of gallons of water. The Pacific Palisades Reservoir could hold more than six million gallons.
Instead, when forecasts showed high fire danger before the inferno broke out, city officials said they relied on a much smaller storage supply — three tanks in the area that had a capacity of about one million gallons each. Hours after the fire’s eruption on the morning of Jan. 7, by 4:45 p.m., one of those tanks was depleted. Another was emptied that night. The third was drained by 3 a.m. the next day, while the fire was still burning. Firefighters reported hydrants running dry in some areas.
It is not certain how much of a difference the extra supply could have made. But it appears clear that the second reservoir, if activated, could have helped maintain total water capacity, in part by helping to sustain water pressure in the area.
Matthew Stumpf, a lawyer who is part of a legal team representing more than 750 wildfire victims, said they had been trying to get records and answers from the city about how both reservoirs were managed. He said water supply issues were central to some of the legal claims surrounding the fire.
“We believe it played a role in the destruction,” he said, adding that fire victims had not been informed that the city had considered restarting the Pacific Palisades Reservoir site.
That site had long been considered a firefighting supplement. Before the city worked to add a floating cover on the Santa Ynez reservoir to improve water quality and security, city officials added a cistern at the Pacific Palisades Reservoir where firefighters could land a helicopter to refill their supply.
Ms. Cheng said the reservoir, built in 1929, had been retired because its low elevation meant water sat there longer than was ideal, creating quality issues. She said cracks were also causing leaks and the reservoir’s roof was compromised.
In recent weeks, crews completed the repair project at the Santa Ynez Reservoir, and the city started refilling the reservoir, hoping to restore it to service this week. But in the process, city officials said, more leaks were discovered, and it had to be drained again.
City officials say they now hope to have the Santa Ynez Reservoir back in service by the end of June.
Mike Baker is a national reporter for The Times, based in Seattle.
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