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Strong winds have been largely blamed for turning the wildfires into infernos that destroyed entire neighbourhoods around a city which has seen no significant rainfall in more than eight months.
ADVERTISEMENTThe Los Angeles County medical examiner’s office has confirmed the death toll from the wildfires ravaging the area has risen to 16.Five of the deaths were attributed to the Palisades Fire and 11 resulted from the Eaton Fire, the coroner’s office said in a statement.The previous number of confirmed fatalities was 11, but officials said they expected that figure to rise as cadaver dogs search levelled neighbourhoods and crews assess the devastation.Firefighters are racing to cut off the spread of the fires before potentially strong winds forecast for next week return and push the flames toward the J. Paul Getty Museum and the University of California.A fierce battle against the flames was underway in Mandeville Canyon, home to Arnold Schwarzenegger and other celebrities not far from the Pacific coast, where swooping helicopters dumped water as the blaze charged downhill.Firefighters on the ground used hoses in an attempt to beat back leaping flames as thick smoke blanketed the chaparral-covered hillside.At a briefing, CalFire Operations Chief Christian Litz said a main focus would be the Palisades Fire burning in the canyon area, not far from the UCLA campus.”We need to be aggressive out there,” Litz said.County Supervisor Lindsey Horvath said the LA area “had another night of unimaginable terror and heartbreak and even more Angelenos evacuated due to the northeast expansion of the Palisades Fire.”Light breezes were fanning the flames but the National Weather Service warned that strong Santa Ana winds could soon return.Those winds have been largely blamed for turning the wildfires into infernos that destroyed entire neighbourhoods around a city which has seen no significant rainfall in more than eight months.The fire also was threatening to jump over Interstate 405 and into densely populated areas in the Hollywood Hills and San Fernando Valley.The search for bodiesThe grim work of sifting through the devastation continued on Saturday, with teams conducting systematic grid searches with cadaver dogs, said Los Angeles County Sheriff Robert Luna.He said a family assistance centre was being established in Pasadena and he urged residents to abide by curfews.”We have people driving up and around trying to get in just to look. Stay away,” he said.ADVERTISEMENTThe fires have consumed about 145 square kilometres, an area larger than San Francisco.Tens of thousands of people remained under evacuation orders and new evacuations were ordered Friday evening after a flare up on the eastern side of the Palisades Fire.Since the fires first began Tuesday just north of downtown LA, they have burned more than 12,000 structures, a term that includes homes, apartment buildings, businesses, outbuildings and vehicles.No cause has been determined for the largest fires and early estimates indicate the wildfires could be the nation’s costliest ever.ADVERTISEMENTA preliminary estimate by AccuWeather put the damage and economic losses so far between $135-150 billion (€131-146 billion).
