Stark images from Los Angeles show abandoned and burnt out cars blocking main roads after residents fled from devastating wildfires.
Sunset Boulevard, the main road in the fire-ravaged Palisades, was blocked by Teslas and other badly damaged vehicles when Daily Express US visited on Friday evening.
Bulldozers had to force dozens of cars to one side to make their way through as they sought to tackle the blaze.
The Palisades Fire, one of the most destructive natural disasters in US history, began to threaten residents on the morning of Tuesday, January 7. It grew at an unprecedented speed, leading to an immediate evacuation call from officials and the destruction of thousands of properties in an area where homes have an average value of $4 million.
“This is Sunset near Palisades Drive – so this was one of the main evacuation arteries and as you can see a lot of the cars got backed up,” Los Angeles Firefighter Lyndsey Lantz told Daily Express US on walk through the Pacific Palisades neighborhood. “Things weren’t moving and people stuck in the front ultimately started getting out of their cars, just trapping everyone here so a lot of these cars were abandoned.”
“You can see some of them have been pushed over by our fire dozers so our engines could get through and fight the fire and then you can also see over there some of them were burned, after all of that happened as well.”
Lantz said the Los Angeles Fire Department made the move to bulldoze cars almost immediately on Tuesday.
She also offered insight into how long the cars could potentially be sitting for and whether they will be taken away by the local government.
“I mean, some of them are still drivable, so the drivers will be able to come back and get their cars,, once the evacuation orders are lifted,” Lantz said. “I’m sure some of them will have to be towed.”
Lantz, who fought the fires herself, addressed speculation about Los Angeles having some issues with fire hydrants in the hills.
“Yeah, so we did have some water issues, especially on that first day,” Lantz explained.
“The thing to understand about, the water systems, especially in these communities high in the hills, the higher you go, the more gravity is affecting the water system.
“The reality is so much was on fire and so much draw was being taken off those tanks that it was impossible for a little while to fill them as fast as they were being emptied.”
At least 11 people have been killed in the LA wildfires, including five people in the Palisades Fire and six in the Eaton Fire, according to the LA County medical examiner’s office. Officials said they expected that number to rise as cadaver dogs go through leveled neighborhoods to assess the devastation, which spans an area larger than San Francisco.
