Anger after fire evacuation alert sent in error to millions in LA

Residents were on the verge of exploding when multiple fires broke out across the Los Angeles area, dismaying millions of people who thought four days later there was no end in sight.

Then on Thursday afternoon came another jolt in the form of a text message alert.

This was mistakenly sent to every phone in the state – home to about 10 million people – warning them that the fire was approaching and that they should prepare to evacuate.

Rebecca Alvarez-Petit was on a work video when her phone started ringing.

A FIRE WARNING has been issued for your area,” the message said.

The noise echoed around him as each of his friends received the same shocking message.

“It was like a real-time horror experience,” he said.

He and his friends began to search and try to see if they were in danger.

The most recent help came in the form of a warning system telling them to ignore the warning but that changed recently, he said.

“We’re all on pins and needles and we’ve been worrying about our phones, we’re watching TV, the radio is going – trying to find out as much as we can because there wasn’t a good plan,” Alvarez said. -Petit, who lives in West Los Angeles.

“And this. It’s like – you’ve got to be kidding me.”

The death toll from the wildfires continues to rise and at least 10 people are known to have died and the threat is likely to rise.

For many, the concern of saving lives and property has turned into a feeling of frustration with the progress of the fire.

Officials have acknowledged other complaints, from dry hydrants hampering firefighting efforts to questions about preparedness and firefighting costs.

The mayor of Los Angeles, Karen Bass, returned to the city from a planned trip to Africa to find fire. He faced serious questions Thursday about the county’s preparedness, its leadership in the crisis and the water crisis that failed to put out the fire.

“Was I disappointed by this? Yes,” said Mayor Bass, responding to a question about water and whether the area was adequately prepared. He said it was an “unprecedented event”.

Like other officials, he emphasized that the fire was able to spread on Tuesday because of strong winds – the same winds that prevented airplanes from dropping water or burning fire on the fire. He said city water systems and local fire systems are not built to handle thousands of acres of fire.

He also said that there will be an investigation into how this happened which will shed light on how the authorities and agencies handled it.

“When lives are saved and homes are saved, we will do a detailed analysis to see what worked, what didn’t work, and correct or answer every agency, department, individual,” he said.

“My focus right now is on lives and homes.”

The evolving tragedy has become the need to understand why this happened and how it became the most destructive fire in Los Angeles history.

As one of the five fires now burning in Los Angeles County approached Larry Villescas’ home on Tuesday, he grabbed the only tool he could – a garden hose.

He and his neighbor made quick work of the wood that was falling into their house from the Eaton Fire and set the grass alight.

Then the hose dried up.

He saw his neighbor’s house in Altadena burning. Then there was a noise – a nearby building was on fire and it sounded like an explosion. He had to leave.

As he was driving his car, he saw a fire engulfing his garage.

“If we had water pressure, we would have been able to fight,” Villescas said, standing in front of his burning home.

He recalled seeing firefighters that night – when people were burning – sitting in their cars, unable to help.

“I remember my anger. It was like ‘doing something,’ but they can’t – there’s no rush of water,” he said. “It’s just really annoying. How can this happen?”

Some experts have attributed the water shortage to excess demand rather than poor management.

“The problem is that the scale of the disaster is so great that there are thousands of firefighters and hundreds of fire engines drawing on water,” Daniel Swain, a climate scientist at the California Institute for Water Resources, told the BBC.

“In the end, only so much water can flow through the pipes at one time.”

Some neighbors shared their view that the government is not prepared even though they see devastating fires all the time.

Hipolito Cisneros, who was exploring the ruins of his now-destroyed home, said that amenities in the area have been in need of renovation for years.

“We’ve lived here for 26 years and we’ve never seen a test,” he says of the fire hydrant at the end of his block that failed to deliver water when it was most needed.

Down the street, Fernando Gonzalez helped his brother clean the house he had lived in for 15 years.

He said his hometown of Santa Clarita – about 45 minutes from Los Angeles County – is also under threat from another wildfire.

“We have been vigilant,” he said. “It’s all around us, you know.”