As residents fled, firefighters scrambled to corral flames churning along Los Angeles hillsides as winds gained strength Tuesday across Southern California, where forecasters said “life-threatening, destructive” gusts could last for days while toppling trees, creating dangerous surf and bringing extreme wildfire risk to areas that haven’t seen substantial rain in months.
Fire crews responded Tuesday morning to a handful of small blazes across the region, including one that prompted evacuation orders for neighborhoods of large homes in the foothills of the Pacific Palisades area in western Los Angeles. The Palisades Fire swiftly consumed more than 200 acres (81 hectares) of dry brush and sent up a huge plume of smoke visible across the city.
The erratic weather caused President Joe Biden to cancel plans to travel to inland Riverside County, California, where he was to announce the establishment of two new national monuments in the state. Biden will deliver his remarks in Los Angeles instead.
, when gusts could reach 80 mph (129 kph). Isolated gusts could top 100 mph (160 kph) in mountains and foothills.
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The actor James Woods posted footage of flames burning through trees on a hill above his Pacific Palisades home.
“Standing in my driveway, getting ready to evacuate,” Woods said in the short video on X.
The weather service warned of possible downed power lines and knocked-over big rigs, trailers, and motorhomes. Strong offshore gusts will also bring dangerous conditions off the coasts of Orange and Los Angeles counties, including Catalina Island, and potential delays and turbulence could arise at local airports.
The Los Angeles Unified School District said it was temporarily relocating students from three campuses in the Pacific Palisades area due to the fire.
Utilities said they were considering preemptively cutting power starting Tuesday to about a half-million customers across eight counties. In recent years, California utilities have routinely de-energized electrical lines as a precaution against weather conditions that might damage equipment and spark a fire.
The winds will act as an “atmospheric blow-dryer” for vegetation, bringing a long period of fire risk that could extend into the more populated lower hills and valleys, according to Daniel Swain, a climate scientist with the University of California, Los Angeles and the National Center for Atmospheric Research.
“We really haven’t seen a season as dry as this one follow a season as wet as the previous one,” Swain said during a Monday livestream. “All of that extra abundant growth of grass and vegetation followed immediately by a wind event of this magnitude while it’s still so incredibly dry,” elevates the risk.
Recent dry winds, including the notorious Santa Anas, have contributed to warmer-than-average temperatures in Southern California, where there’s been very little rain so far this season.
Southern California hasn’t seen more than 0.1 inches (0.25 centimeters) of rain since early May. Much of the region has fallen into moderate drought conditions, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor. Meanwhile, up north, there have been multiple drenching storms.
Areas where gusts could create extreme fire conditions include the charred footprint of last month’s wind-driven Franklin Fire, which damaged or destroyed 48 structures, mostly homes, in and around Malibu.
The blaze was one of nearly 8,000 wildfires that added up to scorch more than 1,560 square miles (more than 4,040 square kilometers) in the Golden State last year.
The last wind event of this magnitude occurred in November 2011, during which more than 400,000 customers lost power across LA County, the Los Angeles Times reported.
“The grid is built to withstand strong winds,” said Jeff Monford, a spokesperson for the utility. “The issue here is the possibility of debris becoming airborne and hitting wires … or a tree coming down.”
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Associated Press writer Jaimie Ding in Los Angeles contributed to this report.
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