Fires in Los Angeles: ‘Everything is gone’
Professional chef Daron Anderson always tells people he was “born in the kitchen”—literally.
The 45-year-old was born in a home birth at 295 West Las Flores Drive, where he lived with his mother until this week.
On Thursday, he stepped over charred debris where his kitchen used to be in Altadena, a tight-knit neighborhood in Northeast Los Angeles.
He searched for his cast-iron pans in the hope they might have survived the blaze, one of several historic blazes burning in the area that killed at least 16 people and decimated multiple communities and left thousands homeless.
Across the street – at number 296 – his friend Rachel’s house is also in ashes. The neighboring house – 281 – where he enjoyed family parties, has disappeared.
About three blocks away, on Devirian Place, where his girlfriend lived, some neighbors used garden hoses to fend off the roaring fire that would engulf their homes.
Now they, too, are searching for precious items in the ruins, after a fire destroyed this entire community nestled in the shadow of the San Gabriel Mountains.
It all started on Tuesday night.
Santa Ana winds were strong most of the day.
Daron was in his yard shortly after 6:00 PM local time trying to secure the items from flying away.
Across the street, at 296 West Las Flores Drive, Rachel Gillespie was taking down Christmas decorations, worried about her plastic ice boxes and patio furniture.
They exchanged worried looks. “This doesn’t look good, does it?” she noticed.
At that time, they were only worried about the wind.
They had no idea that one of the two worst wildfires in LA history had just ignited a few miles away, part of a multi-day nightmare that would culminate in six flames simultaneously threatening America’s second largest city
The Eaton fire that swept through Altadena has now ravaged more than 14,000 acres, destroyed thousands of homes and businesses, and left 11 dead. By the weekend, Eaton remained only 15% restricted.
In West LA, the Palisades Fire, which broke out that morning, will burn more than 23,000 acres, reducing a very vibrant community into ashes, and killed at least five people.
Daron’s first neighbor at 281, Dillon Akers, was at work at a donut stand in the Topanga Mall – about 40 miles away – when smoke began to fill their neighborhood.
The 20-year-old rushed back when he heard the news, only to find his corner of northwest Altadena pitch black and his family members frantically evacuating their home.
His uncle jumped over their white wooden fence to save precious seconds as he stuffed things into the back of his car.
For the next two hours Dillon did the same, gathering food, medicine, clothing and toiletries. In his haste, he lost his keys and wasted 30 minutes searching in the smoky darkness with torches until he found them blown against the fence.
During the desperate search, he kept telling himself that local authorities would be able to deal with the fire that roared down the mountain toward the home he shared with his mother, grandmother, aunt and two younger cousins.
Dillon had faced storms before and seen smoke in the mountains, but this time felt different. This time the orange glow in the sky was right overhead.
“I was a full 10 on the fear scale,” he said.
At 12:30 a.m. Wednesday, Dillon said he and his mother were the last to leave West Las Flores Drive. They may have been the last to get out alive.
The next day, authorities would announce that the remains of a neighbor down the road had been found.
Rachel and Daron left the neighborhood about two hours before Dillon. Rachel was ushered out by a friend who drove up and demanded, “You have to leave now.”
Rachel – with her husband, small child, five cats and two days’ worth of clothes – said goodbye to the house they bought just a year ago.
Daron also grabbed what he could: a guitar he bought when he was 14 with money he earned working as an extra in a karate movie, and a picture of his family crossing Abbey Road in London, made to look like the cover of an iconic Beatles album.
As people on Las Flores Drive evacuated, Daron’s neighbors a few blocks away tried to fight the flames.
At 417 Devirian Place, Hipolito Cisneros and his close friend and neighbor Larry Villescas, who lived across the street at 416, grabbed garden hoses.
The scene outside looked hellish.
The garage of a house was on fire. And the car in front of the other.
They stretched hoses from several homes and doused the structures with water – including the home of Daron’s girlfriend, Sachi.
“The water was just bouncing off. It wasn’t even seeping in or anything,” Hipolito said, referring to the dry ground and brush around the houses.
Over time, they made progress, igniting embers and spotting fires. Larry thought they might be winning.
Then their intestines dried up – all because water pressure problems they later learned he was hindering firefighting efforts in Los Angeles County amid high demand.
An explosion was heard nearby, another house burst into flames. By 01:00 both their families were packing to leave.
“We tried. We really tried,” Hipolito said.
By 2:30 a.m. Wednesday, police cars raced down their street with loudspeakers, telling everyone to leave immediately.
As he turned the corner of his street, Larry watched his garage burn in the rearview mirror of his truck.
By 03:00 the street was empty.
Much of the Los Angeles region is made up of neighborhoods and small communities like Altadena.
Every morning, people would pass through the rows of houses to have a cup of coffee at the Little Red Hen cafe, stopping to catch up on their morning commute.
Many described decades of a close-knit community where they watched neighbors start families and children who once played on the street grow up.
But driving through the area for the first time since his world was destroyed, Daron barely recognizes his neighborhood.
The big blue house that marked a famous turn was gone. All the landmarks that once guided him have disappeared. He points out each neighbor’s property, gasping when he realizes no one is standing.
He takes photos of his and Rachel’s home and the street he shares with Dillon. Outside his girlfriend’s house – which Larry and Hipolito tried to save – he takes a video and talks to their families before calling Sachi to describe the state of her home.
“God, it’s all gone,” he says, his voice cracking.
But a few items remained among the rubble.
At her sister’s home on West Las Flores Drive, she finds multicolored plastic lawn ornaments stuck in her lawn, somehow untouched by the fire.
He plucks each stake from the ground, knowing that while these floral decorations might seem insignificant in the midst of the wasteland, they might also make her smile.
Across the road, in the place where his house used to be, only a red brick chimney remains. Around her is a pile of clay pottery.
He collects what he can with his soot-black hands, but many pieces fall apart at his touch.
A burnt lemon tree stands on the lawn, some fruits still warm to the touch.
“If I can get the seeds, we can plant them again,” he says, grabbing a fistful.
“It’s like a way to start over.”