Live L.A. fire updates: L.A. faces more fire weather next week as residents inspect devastation

The kitten’s paw pads were raw and red.

Her whiskers, mostly gone. Her ears, singed. Her eyelids, swollen.

They were drawn to the Altadena foothills for the hummingbirds and the bats and the peacocks. It was the view of the canyon, downtown skyscrapers, and Santa Catalina Island, somehow all in one frame.

Everyone on Leilani Way knew the risks of living in the San Gabriel Mountains’ fire-prone foothills. The benefits just outweighed them.

Night had fallen on the Pasadena temple.

The community had braced for high winds; Hebrew school had been canceled earlier. But no one had prepared for a fire to erupt and tear their synagogue apart.

Why was so much of Altadena burned? To understand the path of the Eaton Fire, The Times made an extensive review of firefighter radio transmissions and interview residents and firefighters. So findings:

• The fire immediately threatened hillside homes around Eaton Canyon. Firefighters got to the scene quickly and saved homes, but winds were by then pushing flames and embers west toward the heart of Altadena.
  
• As the blaze grew, firefighting resources were no match. Aircraft were grounded almost immediately amid intense wind, and fire operations became more about saving lives than protecting structures.
  
• Embers traveled up to two miles to the west, passing over some neighborhoods but hitting central Altadena hard. Within hours, entire blocks were on fire.
  

Read the full investigation here.

When residents first saw flames on a hillside in Eaton Canyon, the fire itself was not that large.

But with gusts clocked at 59 mph, the fire quickly started pushing a shower of sparks across the canyon.

President-elect Donald Trump, who is scheduled to be sworn into office on Monday, has announced that his first official trip as the nation’s leader will be to Southern California to tour the devastated areas.

Trump has spent much of the last 10 days hurling abuse at California’s leaders for what he sees as their mismanagement of the crisis sparked when hurricane force winds flames tearing through multiple locations in greater Los Angeles.

“One of the best and most beautiful parts of the United States of America is burning down to the ground,” Trump posted to Truth Social on Jan. 8. “It’s ashes, and Gavin Newscum should resign. This is all his fault!!!”

Trump is expected to arrive late next week, according to a story published by The Hill.

The California FAIR Plan Assn., the state’s property insurer of last resort, was born of smoldering ashes — not of a wildfire, but of one of the worst urban disturbances in U.S. history.

The Watts riots in 1965 damaged or destroyed more than 600 buildings, causing insurers to flee and highlighting the need for a new type of carrier to step in.

The locker rooms where the teams from Oregon and Ohio State dressed for the College Football Playoff quarterfinals are now a command center and a briefing room. Outside, firefighters and National Guard troops mill about the wide concourse where, less than three weeks ago, more than 90,000 football fans gathered.

And the sprawling grass fields that were recently home to dozens of tailgate parties now hold hundreds of tiny pup tents.

Squeals of joy can be heard from the playground at Eagle Rock Recreation Center. A group of 30 children is huddled into groups according to their favorite breakfast item.

“I like pancakes better than waffles,” one child announced.

The fire refugees arrive with regularity at the checkpoint on Pacific Coast Highway. They come alone or in pairs, lining up behind the clutch of police cruisers and a National Guard Humvee, pleading to get back to homes inside the Palisades wildfire perimeter.

They want medicines and other necessities, sure. But they also want a sense of knowing: What has the great Palisades wildfire done to their homes and to their lives?

The union that represents more than 3,000 Los Angeles city firefighters renewed its support for Fire Chief Kristin Crowley on Friday, denouncing an anonymous letter that accused her of mishandling the response to the massively destructive Palisades fire.

United Firefighters of Los Angeles City Local 112 condemned a letter circulated this week — one that claimed to be from “retired and active LAFD chief officers” but contained no names or signatures — saying Crowley had “failed” the residents of Los Angeles and lost the confidence of Mayor Karen Bass.

Every other day, Joseph McKinney, Joseph Sevilla and Sal Almanza wake up around 4 a.m. and eat breakfast at their base camp at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena before heading up the San Gabriel Mountains to do battle with one of the most destructive fires in Los Angeles County history.

Their firefighting tasks, which are assigned each day by their captains, could include containment work, structure defense or removing dry vegetation to try and stop the spread of the blaze. The men work either 12- or 24-hour shifts and if they work the latter, they get the next day off to recuperate at base camp.