International
‘Run for your lives!’ Los Angeles residents abandon cars to flee wildfire on foot
‘Run for your lives!’ Los Angeles residents abandon cars to flee wildfire on foot
Screaming Los Angeles residents left their cars behind to flee a fast-moving wildfire as it closed in on a picturesque celebrity enclave, eyewitnesses said, describing scenes straight out of a Hollywood disaster movie.
A windstorm whipped a seemingly typical brush fire into a raging inferno within a matter of hours on Tuesday, sending the blaze racing towards the Pacific Palisades area.
Thirty thousand people were ordered to evacuate as the conflagration surrounded the neighbourhood in the west of the city, exploding rapidly from 10 acres to several thousand in size.
Bordering Malibu, Pacific Palisades is a haven of hillside streets and winding roads nestled against the Santa Monica Mountains and extending down to beaches along the Pacific Ocean.
But the Pacific Coast Highway, the main route in – or out – quickly became gridlocked, leading many motorists to ditch their vehicles near Sunset Boulevard as the flames drew near.
One resident, Marsha Horowitz, said firefighters told people to get out of their cars as the blaze, fanned by gusts sometimes topping 100mph (160km/h) in the mountains and foothills, approached.
“The fire was right up against the cars,” she said.
Another Pacific Palisades resident told ABC News that she rushed home from her job in Hollywood once she heard about the evacuations.
After abandoning her car, she went home to grab her cat. While running to safety, flaming pieces of palm tree fell on her.
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“I’m getting hit with palm leaves on fire, I ran into a car,” said the woman, who did not give her name.
“It’s terrifying. It’s like a horror movie. I’m screaming and crying going down the street.”
Some evacuees described seeing homes burn as they fled.
Hollywood actor James Woods was among celebrities forced to flee their properties.
Actor Steve Guttenberg, also a Pacific Palisades resident, urged people who abandoned their cars to leave their keys inside so the vehicles could be moved to make way for fire trucks.
“This is not a parking lot,” Guttenberg told KTLA. “I have friends up there and they can’t evacuate.”
Bulldozers later cleared abandoned vehicles to open the route for emergency vehicles.
Jennifer Aniston, Bradley Cooper, Tom Hanks, Reese Witherspoon, Adam Sandler and Michael Keaton also have homes in the Pacific Palisades, according to the Hollywood Reporter.
People fled wildfire flames in the nearby Los Angeles suburb of Topanga Canyon, where Ewan McGregor has a home.
One resident named Melanie told KTLA she tried to get out, but the path was engulfed by flames and she was forced back home.
She was trying to take Palisades Drive down to the Pacific Coast Highway and said had to make “a very fast U-turn because there were flames coming down the hill to the road”.
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“I would have been driving right into the fire,” she said. “We’re stuck up here. I don’t see any flames but I know they’re close by.”
Residents in Venice Beach, some six miles (10km) away, reported seeing the flames, too.
Kelsey Trainor said ash fell all around as the fire jumped from one side of the road to the other.
“People were getting out of the cars with their dogs and babies and bags, they were crying and screaming,” she told the Associated Press news agency.
“The road was just blocked, like full-on blocked for an hour.”
Ellen Delosh-Bacher told the Los Angeles Times how she rushed from downtown Los Angeles to her home, where her 95-year-old mother and their two dogs live.
She, too, hit gridlock at Sunset Boulevard and Palisades Drive.
Ms Delosh-Bacher described fire exploding behind a nearby Starbucks and police rushing down the road shouting to stuck motorists: “Run for your lives!”
She left her car, keys still in the ignition and ran half a mile down to the beach.
“This is like an apocalypse,” she said.
‘Run for your lives!’ Los Angeles residents abandon cars to flee wildfire on foot
BBC
International
Los Angeles wildfires: Five die as wildfire sweeps through California (photos)
Los Angeles wildfires: Five die as wildfire sweeps through California (photos)
Firefighters in Los Angeles, US, are battling several blazes in the city’s suburbs, prompting the mandatory evacuation of more than 80,000 people.
The fires were sparked by a combination of dry conditions and powerful winds. Currently, authorities say there is no possibility of bringing some of the fires under control.
More than 2,000 structures have been burnt with 80,000 residents under evacuation orders. At least five people have also been k!lled in the fire.
According to BBC, seven fires are currently being tackled;
The Palisades fire was first reported at 10:30 (18:30 GMT) on Tuesday and grew in just 20 minutes from a blaze of 20 acres to more than 200 acres, and by Wednesday night was approaching 16,000 acres. At least 30,000 people have so far been ordered to leave their homes.
The Eaton fire grew to cover 1,000 acres within the first six hours of breaking out. It started in Altadena in the hills above Pasadena at around 18:30 local time on Tuesday. By Wednesday night, January 8, five deaths had been reported and it had spread to more than 10,000 acres.
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The Hurst fire is located just north of San Fernando. It began burning on Tuesday at around 22:10 local time, growing to 850 acres, according to local officials. It has triggered evacuation orders in neighbouring Santa Clarita.
The Woodley fire broke out in Woodley Park at approximately 06:15 local time on Wednesday. The LA Fire Department (LAFD) says it has now been contained.
An Olivas fire erupted in Ventura County, northwest of Los Angeles, and was burning across about 11 acres of land, though has also now been contained.
The Lidia fire broke out at around 14:00 on Wednesday in the mountainous Acton area north of Los Angeles and grew to cover almost 350 acres. As of 21:00, it had been 40% contained.
The Sunset fire broke out at around 18:00 in the Hollywood Hills, a residential neighbourhood overlooking the historic Hollywood area of the city. It currently covers around 50 acres and is 0% contained. A mandatory evacuation order is in place.
Many Hollywood stars including Ben Affleck, Paris Hilton, Adam Brody, Eugene Levy, Miles Teller Leighton Meester, Anna Faris, Billy Crystal, and many more have been forced to evacuate their mansions which have been destroyed by the fire.
Los Angeles wildfires: Five die as wildfire sweeps through California (photos)
International
Myanmar: Junta air strike kills 40
Myanmar: Junta air strike kills 40
A rescue worker and an ethnic minority armed group told AFP on Thursday that a Myanmar junta airstrike killed at least 40 people in a village in western Rakhine state.
The Arakan Army (AA) is fighting the military for control of Rakhine, where it has seized swathes of territory in the past year, all but cutting off the capital Sittwe.
The Rakhine conflict is one element of the bloody chaos that has engulfed Myanmar since the military ousted Aung San Suu K.
According to AA spokesperson Khaing Thu Kha, a military jet bombed Kyauk Ni Maw on Ramree Island around 1:20 pm (0650 GMT) on Wednesday, causing a fire that engulfed over 500 houses.
“According to initial reports, 40 innocent civilians were killed and 20 were wounded,” he said.
A local rescue group member reported 41 deaths and 52 injuries.
“At the moment, we don’t even have enough betadine and methylated spirit to treat them, as the transportation is hard,” the rescue worker said on condition of anonymity to protect their safety.
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Ramree Island is home to a planned China-backed deep-sea port that will serve as a gateway for Beijing to the Indian Ocean, but construction has been halted by the unrest.
Photos of the aftermath of the bombing show dazed residents walking through charred, smoking ruins, the ground littered with corrugated metal, trees stripped bare of leaves, and buildings reduced to a few scraps of walls.
The military is struggling to fight opposition to its rule.
In addition to the youth-led “People’s Defence Forces” that arose to counter the coup, the military is fighting various long-established and well-equipped ethnic minority armed organisations, including the AA, that hold huge sections of land along the country’s border.
In November, the United Nations Development Programme warned that Rakhine was on the verge of famine as violence hampered commerce and agricultural production.
The United Nations said this week that the violence in Myanmar had displaced more than 3.5 million people, an increase of 1.5 million from last year.
The picture for the coming year was “grim,” according to the UN humanitarian organisation OCHA, with 19.9 million people—more than a third of the population—expected to require assistance by 2025.
Myanmar: Junta air strike kills 40
International
Six dead in India temple stampede
Six dead in India temple stampede
At least six people were crushed to death at a Hindu religious gathering in India, with several more injured, officials said Thursday.
A huge crowd had gathered to collect entrance tokens to visit the Sri Venkateswara Swamy Temple in the southern state of Andhra Pradesh when the stampede broke out on Wednesday.
“The unfortunate incident… has claimed the lives of six devotees. I pray to god to give peace to the departed souls,” Prem Kumar Jain, spokesman of the state’s ruling Telugu Desam Party, told reporters.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi offered condolences to the families of the deceased.
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“My thoughts are with those who have lost their near and dear ones,” his office said on social media platform X.
Deadly accidents are common at places of worship in India during major religious festivals due to poor crowd management and safety lapses.
In July last year, 121 people were killed in northern Uttar Pradesh state during a Hindu religious gathering.
Another 112 people died in 2016 after a huge explosion caused by a banned fireworks display marking the Hindu new year at a temple in southern Kerala state.
Wednesday’s incident comes days before the start of the Kumbh Mela, a six-week Hindu festival of prayer and sacred bathing expected to be the largest religious gathering in history.
Up to 400 million pilgrims are expected to attend, according to organisers.
Six dead in India temple stampede
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