Wildfires in at least six neighbourhoods of the US city of Los Angeles have gutted homes and businesses spread over an area of more than 17,000 acres as American authorities continued a mammoth firefighting effort on Thursday.
As per US media, the fire tore through the iconic Hollywood Hills and destroyed the homes of several prominent American celebrities on Thursday evening.
Satellite images captured by Maxar Technologies and Planet Labs PBC show extensive damage to several high-profile areas.
Emergency crews were battling several other uncontrollable blazes, leading to urgent evacuations. At least five deaths have been reported.
While wildfires are common in Southern California, they seldom pose such a threat to metropolitan areas. “This firestorm is the big one,” Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass has declared.
Mandatory evacuation orders have been issued for more than 1 lakh residents. Hundreds of thousands of people were with electricity. Glowing embers floated through the sky like lightning bugs as thick black smoke turned day into night.
Out of six separate wildfires in Los Angeles, three were totally out of control, including a pair of huge conflagrations on the city’s eastern and western flanks and the smaller Sunset Fire raging in Hollywood Hills just above Hollywood Boulevard and its Walk of Fame.
Authorities have deployed 836 firefighters, seven helicopters, 149 fire tenders, and four dozeers and water tenders each, according to Cal Fire, the state fire agency. Numerous firefighting air tankers from throughout California state were flying fire suppression missions.
The largest blaze, the uncontained 15,000-acre Palisades Fire, had already consumed over 1,000 structures, making it the most destructive in Los Angeles history, reports New York Times.
On Thursday morning (India time), about 16 million people in Southern California were under a red flag warning, the highest fire-related alert. The agency predicted that “extremely critical” fire weather conditions, caused by strong winds and dry conditions, would ease overnight but remain “critically elevated” through at least Friday.
