Some residents allowed to return to devastated Pacific Palisades, Altadena neighborhoods
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With fire containment improving and winds dying down, some residents are being allowed back into neighborhoods devastated by the Palisades and Eaton fires, though checkpoints still remained in other places.
One day earlier, when evacuation orders in the neighborhood were lifted after more than a week, a line of cars stretched half a mile long north to Mulholland Drive, a California Highway Patrol officer said.
He estimated 2,000 cars had entered the checkpoint during his shift, with CHP and the National Guard carefully verifying proof of residency before allowing people to drive in.
That meant that although Carl Rheuban, 75, returned home Thursday, his son’s partner, who doesn’t live with them, was a victim of bad timing as she was denied access.
“Even as a passenger, they won’t let her up,” Rheuban said Friday morning before the checkpoint was removed. “I have another son who lives in Woodland Hills – they won’t let him in. He can’t come up to help me; we’ve got three freezers full of food that spoiled that I have to throw out.”
Evacuated residents can now freely enter the northern part of the Topanga area from Topanga Canyon Boulevard at Cezanne Avenue, after officials late Friday morning removed the security checkpoint that had been set up there.
Farther south on Topanga Canyon Boulevard, a checkpoint at Viewridge Road was still in place as of 1 p.m. Friday, with only residents who live south of the intersection permitted to enter.
Los Angeles County officials say as many as 11,000 people will be able to return home as crews continue to get a handle on fires that started during an extreme wind event on Jan. 7.
David Combs, 63, was one of the first residents to make it through the checkpoint Thursday. He ignored evacuation orders for the first two days after the Palisades fire broke out, remaining inside his home of 24 years at the Woodland Park Mobile Estates.
But with no electricity and the fire raging, he left the complex on Jan. 9.
“Hotels were gouging me, so I ended up sleeping in a big van that I have,” Combs, a construction project manager, said outside his three-bedroom home Friday.
“It was rough.”
He was desperate to get back home right away.
When he evacuated, Combs had taken the ashes of his parents and put them in a storage unit for safekeeping, which he said tormented him.
“It was the first thing I grabbed,” he said. “I didn’t want to carry them around in case something happened. And it just broke my heart to think of my mom and dad in a storage unit.”
The fires have destroyed more than 12,000 structures, including many homes, making them two of the most destructive — and deadliest — wildfires in California history. More than 8,600 firefighters from around the world are working the fires, with the focus over the next several days on constructing containment lines and extinguishing hot spots to prevent the fires from spreading.
As the weather has begun to cooperate, firefighters have become more aggressive to get it under control before winds return next week.
“Every day we’re getting aggressive. We know what’s coming and the impact this fire has had on the community already,” said Colin Noyes, an information officer on the Palisades fire.
In the first days of last week’s fire storm, crews were on the defensive as extreme winds blew red-hot firebrand and embers across the landscape, starting fires faster than they could be put out. Firefighters were swarming into the region as the fire marched into neighborhoods and jackpots of dry, unburned brush in the foothills and rugged canyons.
Over the weekend, crews established perimeters around both the Eaton and Palisades fires, corralling them in. Since then, firefighters have been turning the tide on the blazes bit by bit.
“We go 300 feet in from the perimeter and put out any hot spots, and any smokes we see,” Noyes said.
Officials said on Friday they don’t expect either fire to grow in acreage as they continue to attack the blaze where it flares up.
Jim Hudson, an operations chief with the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection on the Palisades fire, told community members Thursday night at Sinai Temple in Westwood that they’ve kept the fire from growing for several days and haven’t seen it spread since Saturday.
“That is a testament to the hard work of the firefighters that have been on the line, working around the clock multiple shifts, and their dedication to all of you,” he told the audience.
He said they expect containment to continue to grow in the coming days. In addition, they are using infrared aerial imaging to make sure “this thing is completely cooled off.”
Despite the progress, some fire experts expressed remorse.
Joe Everett, assistant Los Angeles Fire Chief and incident commander when Pacific Palisades burned, wished more could have been done quicker to spare the loss of thousands of homes and at least the deaths of 10 in the area.
“It’s extremely, extremely hard for me to look you in the eye, knowing that, quite honestly, I feel like I failed you in some respect,” Everett, a third-generation firefighter, said at that community meeting in Westwood.
His candor garnered a round of applause while some residents yelled, “why could you save our homes!”
This article is provided free of charge to help keep our community safe and supported during these devastating fires.
In the Palisades fire area, officials reopened the areas north of Topanga Canyon Boulevard and south of Mulholland Drive; north of Old Topanga Canyon Road and south of Summit to Summit Motorway; north of Mulholland Highway and south of Stokes Canyon Road and north of Red Rock Road and south of Calabasas Peak Motorway.
In the Eaton fire area, residents that live along Canyon Crest Road into the Meadows community east of El Prieto Road were allowed to return beginning at 3 p.m.
“A soft closure means the area is closed to the general public,” the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department said in a statement. “It is still open to disaster crews, public safety personnel, and residents with identification only. Only residents with valid proof of residence — driver’s license, registration, utility bills, etc. — are allowed to enter and exit the soft closure area.”
The following zones are now open to residents only:
City of Los Angeles
- LOS-Q0765: North of Mulholland Drive and south of Adlon Road
- LOS-Q1118: North of Mulholland Drive and south of Hayvenhurst Drive
- LOS-Q0798: South of Mulholland Drive
- LOS-Q0782-B: South of Mission Dump Road
- LOS-Q0778-A: East of Canyonback Road
- LOS-Q0781-A: East of Canyonback Road near Mountaingate Drive
- LOS-Q0782-A: Area east of Mt. Saint Mary’s Fire Road
- LOS-Q0780: Area east of North Kenter Avenue
Los Angeles County
- DRY-U026-A: North of Mulholland Highway and south of Stokes Canyon Road
- RRC-U027-A: North of Red Rock Road and south of Calabasas Peak Motorway
- TOP-U002: North of Old Topanga Canyon Road and south of Summit to Summit Motorway
- TOP-U001: North of Topanga Canyon Boulevard and south of Mulholland Drive
For the Eaton fire, Altadena residents who live along Canyon Crest Road into the Meadows east of El Prieto Road can also reenter the area with identification.
The specific zones are as follows:
- ALD-MEADOWS
- ALD-MILARD B
- ALD-MILARD C
Entry and exit points will be at the intersection of Canyon Crest Road and Lincoln Avenue.
Winds are expected to continue dissipating this week, but it’s shaping up to be a short reprieve for the region. There’s growing risk that significant fire weather could return to Los Angeles and Ventura counties starting early next week. The region is also facing continued danger from extreme dry conditions and lack of rain.
The Eaton fire, which burned though Altadana and surrounding neighborhoods, was 65% contained as of Friday morning. The fire has not grown in size since Jan. 10 when the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection listed it as 14,117 acres. Since then, crews have been working to surround the fire, secure defenses and keep it from growing past their lines.
As firefighters continue to battle multiple major wildfires, The Times has compiled a list of resources to help.
Similarly, the Palisades fire’s size has remained listed at 23,713 acres since Sunday as crews from far and wide have flowed into the fire zone and constructed a perimeter around it. The fire’s containment has increased from 11% on Sunday to 31% as of Friday morning, meaning firefighters are confident that nearly a third of the fire’s perimeter won’t go past their defenses.
As the search through the rubble continues, the number of confirmed deaths in the fires climbed to at least 27.
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