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Los Angeles wildfires trigger air quality warnings and health concerns

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Business was brisk at Teddy's Cocina in Pasadena as wildfire evacuees ate lunch and passersby ducked indoors to escape from the brown, smoky air blanketing the city.

"It's not breathable," said Dulce Perez, a cook at the restaurant, as an eye-watering haze hung overhead on Thursday about two miles (3.2 km) away from one of the multiple fires burning around Los Angeles. "We just try to stay indoors."
This week, as the wildfires raged and smoke billowed across Los Angeles, officials issued air quality alerts, schools canceled classes and scientists warned about the dangerous - even fatal - consequences of wildfire smoke.
All around the United States' second-largest city, residents worried about air that has, at times, turned lung-burning from the ash, soot, and smoke emanating from fires that have destroyed 10,000 structures.
Air purifiers were sold out at some big-box stores, according to interviews with employees at four businesses. Some residents were taping windows to keep the smoke out of their homes. And Los Angeles officials urged people to stay indoors in areas where smoke was visible.
While conditions improved on Friday, an air quality alert remained in effect until the evening and dangerous particulate matter remained around four times World Health Organization guidelines.
At the Pasadena Convention Center, which has been converted to a temporary shelter, aid workers from Sean Penn's global humanitarian organization, CORE, were handing out N95 masks on Friday.
Emergency response programs manager Sunny Lee said the homeless were particularly vulnerable to bad air.
"There was no place for them to go inside, and so they were suffering even more outside with the poor air quality, without any kind of masks," said Lee. "So, we pushed out N95 to our partners that reached those communities. We're distributing as many as we can."

A HOVERING HAZE

Fanned by fierce winds and fueled by vegetation bone-dry after a long period of little or no rain, the Los Angeles fires broke out on Tuesday and have relentlessly burned more than 34,000 acres (13,760 hectares), or some 53 square miles (137 sq km). Neighborhoods have turned to ash in some parts of Los Angeles.
Wildfire smoke typically carries with it noxious gases and particulate matter that make it more toxic than normal air pollution. Not only do wildfires burn plants, brush, and trees, but also buildings, houses and cars that contain plastics, fuels, metals and a host of chemicals.
Studies have linked wildfire smoke with higher rates of heart attacks, strokes, and cardiac arrests as well as weakened immune defenses.
Environmental health scientists and doctors warned that particulate matter posed a hazard to people with preexisting lung and heart conditions as well as the elderly and children.
Carlos Gould, an environmental health scientist at the University of California San Diego, said the concentration of fine particulate matter in the Los Angeles area reached alarming levels between 40 and 100 micrograms per cubic meter earlier in the week before declining to around 20 on Friday.
The WHO recommended a maximum is 5 micrograms per cubic meter.
"The levels of wildfire smoke we've seen in LA these past few days imply between a 5-15% increase in daily mortality," Gould said.
Chemical byproducts from the fires, particularly those stemming from burned man-made materials, penetrate deeper into the lungs and can even enter the bloodstream, said Dr. Afif El-Hasan, a spokesperson for the American Lung Association.
"If you're working harder to breathe and your body is being challenged that way, it can also put a strain on the heart. And that's why you see an increase in heart attacks," said El-Hasan.
Even well outside of the immediate fire zone, residents complained about the smoke. With winds blowing wildfire smoke out to sea, customers at the Potholder Cafe in the coastal community of Long Beach declined to sit outdoors.
Manager Veronica Gutierrez said she bought an air purifier for her home, but it has made little difference.
"We definitely have the smell of burning," said Gutierrez.
For some people across Los Angeles, the risks will not end when the fires are put out, experts warned.
Justin Gillenwater, burn director at the Los Angeles General Medical Center, expected long-term health impacts from smoke inhalation among people with respiratory conditions and allergies.
"This is going to be something that we're going to be looking into for not just weeks, but really years," he said.
- In the close-knit Los Angeles suburb of Altadena, where rows of neat bungalows once nestled in the shadow of the San Gabriel Mountains, smoldering ruins and the skeletal frames of burnt-out cars now lie.
While the fires that have devastated celebrity neighborhoods near Malibu have caught the world's attention, a similar-sized blaze in Eaton Canyon, north of Los Angeles, has ravaged Altadena, a racially and economically diverse community.
Black and Latino families have lived in Altadena for generations and the suburb is also popular with younger artists and engineers working at the nearby NASA rocket lab who were attracted by the small-town vibe and access to nature.
Many residents told Reuters they were concerned that government resources would be channeled towards high-profile areas popular with A-Listers, while insurance companies might shortchange less affluent households that do not have the financial means to contest fire claims.
"They're not going to give you the value of your house ... if they do, you really have to fight for it," said Kay Young, 63, her eyes welling up with tears as she stared at a sprawl of smoking rubble, the remnants of a home that has been in her family for generations.
Inez Moore, 40, whose family home in Altadena was destroyed by the fire, said communities like theirs would likely suffer financially more than wealthier suburbs because many residents do not have the resources or experience to navigate complex bureaucratic systems.
"You're going to have some folks who are not going to get as much as they deserve, and some folks who may get more than actually they need," said Moore, a lecturer at California State University.
Reuters contacted major home insurance companies in California for comment.
State Farm, Nationwide, Allstate, Mercury, Liberty Mutual and Farmers responded with statements saying they were working with policyholders to help them make claims, without addressing specific concerns raised by Altadena residents.
Moore, Young and several other residents told Reuters they did not see any fire engines in Altadena in the early hours of Wednesday when they fled flames engulfing their community, fueling a resentment that their neighborhood was not a priority.
"We didn't get help here. I don't know where everybody was," said Jocelyn Tavares, 32, as her sister and daughter dug through the smoking debris of a life upended - a child's bicycle half-melted, a solitary cup miraculously spared from the flames.
Item 1 of 5 Inez Moore and her father Michael Moore stand near their burned family home after the Eaton Fire tore through a neighborhood, while a pair of massive wildfires menacing Los Angeles from the east and west were still burning uncontained, in Altadena, California, U.S. January 9, 2025. REUTERS/Mario Anzuoni
[1/5]Inez Moore and her father Michael Moore stand near their burned family home after the Eaton Fire tore through a neighborhood, while a pair of massive wildfires menacing Los Angeles from the east and west were still burning uncontained, in Altadena, California, U.S. January 9, 2025. REUTERS/Mario... Purchase Licensing Rights, opens new tab Read more
Los Angeles County Fire Department did not respond to calls and emails requesting comment.

REBUILD

Since breaking out on Tuesday night, the Eaton Fire has killed at least five people and had grown to 13,690 acres (5,540 hectares) as of Thursday night, consuming much of the northern half of Altadena, an unincorporated community of some 40,000 people.
As late as 1960, Altadena was almost entirely white. As new highways built in urban renewal projects tore apart Los Angeles neighborhoods, African American families began buying homes in what remained for decades a relatively affordable community.
Residents told Reuters they paid around $50,000 for a three-bedroom home in Altadena in the 1970s. The same house would cost more than $1 million today.
By 1990, nearly 40% of residents were Black. Today, about 18% are Black, 49% white and 27% are Hispanic or Latino, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
Altadena residents voiced concerns that the area may become more gentrified if families who have lived here for generations could not secure insurance payouts to cover the cost to rebuild a home that they bought cheap decades ago.
Despite the widespread wreckage, many locals were upbeat about the community rising from the ashes, sharing tales of narrow escapes and memories of decades spent growing up together with neighbors who were now sharing in the disaster.
"There are rows of us that went to school together," said Young, gesturing to a vast stretch of scorched foundations.
Michael McCarthy, 68, a clerk in the City of Los Angeles, said his home was saved by a neighbor who risked his life by staying behind after everyone else had fled, using a hose to spray water on their roofs.
"I know this community will rebuild, everybody knows everybody here, everybody loves everybody," said McCarthy, who is due to retire this year.
"Well, I got a new job now, and that's putting all this back together and do what I can for the neighborhood."
 Firefighters finally started gaining control over two major wildfires on the eastern and western flanks of Los Angeles on Friday as fierce winds that supercharged the fires for days finally eased.
Six simultaneous wildfires have devastated Los Angeles County neighborhoods since Tuesday, killed at least 11 people and damaged or destroyed 10,000 structures. Those totals are expected to grow once it is safe enough for firefighters to conduct house-to-house searches.
With thousands of people suddenly homeless and the thickening smoke leading U.S. officials to declare a public health emergency, firefighters reported progress arresting the Palisades Fire on the western edge of the city and the Eaton Fire in the foothills east of the sprawling metropolis.
After burning out of control for days, despite the efforts of hundreds of firefighters attacking the blazes from the air and on the ground, the Palisades Fire was 8% contained and the Eaton Fire 3%. Cal Fire had listed containment levels of both fires at 0% until Friday.
Even so, the two big fires combined had consumed 35,000 acres (14,100 hectares) - or 54 square miles, 2-1/2 times the land area of Manhattan.
Some 153,000 people remained under evacuation orders and another 166,800 faced evacuation warnings, with a curfew in place for all evacuation zones, Los Angeles County Sheriff Robert Luna said.
Seven neighboring states, the federal government and Canada have rushed aid to California, bolstering aerial teams dropping water and fire retardant on the flaming hills and crews on the ground attacking fire lines with hand tools and hoses.
"Thanks to the increased number of resources assigned, the region is in a much better posture than we were earlier this week," Los Angeles County Fire Chief Anthony Marrone told a press conference.
Conditions in the Los Angeles area will improve through the weekend, with sustained winds slowing to about 20 mph (32 kph), gusting between 35 mph and 50 mph, according to the National Weather Service, a respite from recent wind gusts of 80 mph.
"It's not as gusty, so that should help firefighters," NWS meteorologist Allison Santorelli said, adding that conditions were still critical with low humidity and dry vegetation.
However, forecasters predicted another red flag warning would be issued for Monday.

HOMES REDUCED TO ASH

The psychological toll on a traumatized county of nearly 10 million people has yet to be assessed.
Pacific Palisades residents who ventured back to their devastated neighborhoods were shocked to find brick chimneys looming over charred waste and burnt-out vehicles as acrid smoke lingered in the air.
Item 1 of 13 Firefighters shut off water to stop leaks at destroyed homes following the Palisades Fire in the Pacific Palisades neighborhood in Los Angeles, California, U.S. January 10, 2025. REUTERS/David Ryder
[1/13]Firefighters shut off water to stop leaks at destroyed homes following the Palisades Fire in the Pacific Palisades neighborhood in Los Angeles, California, U.S. January 10, 2025. REUTERS/David Ryder Purchase Licensing Rights, opens new tab
"This was a house that was loved," Pacific Palisades resident Kelly Foster, 44, said while combing through the ashy rubble where her house once stood as smoke rose from neighboring homes and planes dropped water nearby.
Foster's 16-year-old daughter, Ada, said she tried to get inside but "I just became sick. I just couldn't even... Yeah, it's hard."
In Rick McGeagh's Palisades neighborhood, only six of 60 homes survived, and all that remained standing at his ranch house was a statue of the Virgin Mary.
"Everything else is ash and rubble," said McGeagh, 61, a commercial real estate broker, who along with his wife, raised three children at their home.
On Friday morning, hundreds of people streamed into a parking lot near the Rose Bowl stadium in Pasadena for donated clothing, diapers and bottled water.
Denise Doss, 63, said she was anxious to return to her destroyed home in Altadena to see if anything was salvageable, but officials stopped her due to safety concerns.
"At least to say goodbye until we can rebuild. I will let God lead me," Doss said.
Many Altadena residents said they were worried government resources would go to wealthier areas and that insurers might short-change those who cannot afford to contest denials of fire claims.
Beyond those who lost their homes, tens of thousands remained without power, and millions of people were exposed to poorer air quality, as the fires lofted traces of metals, plastics and other synthetic materials.

BILLIONS IN LOSSES

Private forecaster AccuWeather estimated the damage and economic loss at $135 billion to $150 billion, portending an arduous recovery and soaring homeowners' insurance costs.
California Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara called on insurers on Friday to suspend pending non-renewals and cancellations that homeowners received before the fires began and to extend the grace period for payments.
President Joe Biden has declared the fires a major disaster and said the U.S. government would reimburse 100% of the recovery for the next six months. In a call with Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass and California Governor Gavin Newsom on Friday he reiterated his pledge to provide California with resources to fight the blazes and rebuild.
"This is not going to be over, even when all the fires are out, it's just going to be beginning ... so we're going to be around a long while to help," Biden told an Oval Office briefing.

At least 11 people were killed and thousands of structures were burned as fierce wildfires raged in the Los Angeles area. The dead include four men and one woman who were unable to leave or had stayed behind to defend their homes in Altadena, a community near Pasadena that is home to working and middle-class families, including many Black residents living there for generations.

Anthony Mitchell and his son, Justin

Anthony Mitchell, a 67-year-old amputee, and his son, Justin, who has cerebral palsy, were waiting for an ambulance to come for them.

“They didn’t make it out,” said Mitchell’s daughter, Hajime White.

She said authorities told the family Mitchell was found by the side of his son’s bed in Altadena. The Washington Post reported the family believes Mitchell was trying to save his son, who was in his early 20s.

“He was not going to leave his son behind. No matter what,” White said. White, who lives in Warren, Arkansas, and is Justin’s step-sister, said her father called her Wednesday morning and said they had to evacuate from approaching flames. “Then he said, ‘I’ve got to go — the fire’s in the yard,’” she recalled Thursday.

Another son, also in his 20s, lived with the pair but was in the hospital, and no caregivers were on hand, White said, adding “It’s very hard. It’s like a ton of bricks just fell on me.”

White didn’t respond to a Facebook message from The Associated Press seeking comment.

Victor Shaw

Victor Shaw stayed behind to try to fight the Eaton Fire and was found holding a garden hose in his hand after the blaze swept through his neighborhood.

Shari Shaw told news outlet KTLA she tried to get her 66-year-old brother to evacuate with her Tuesday night as the fire approached the home they shared. He told her he wanted to stay behind and try to fight the fire, she recalled.

“When I went back in and yelled out his name, he didn’t reply back, and I had to get out because the embers were so big and flying like a firestorm – I had to save myself,” she said. “And I looked behind me, and the house was starting to go up in flames, and I had to leave.”

A family friend, Al Tanner, told KTLA they found Victor’s charred body on the side of the road with the hose the next morning. Said Tanner, “It looks like he was trying to save the home that his parents had for almost 55 years.”

Rodney Nickerson

Rodney Nickerson, an 82-year-old Altadena resident, died in his bed after staying behind because he felt that he would be OK waiting it out at home, said his daughter, Kimiko Nickerson.

She spoke with KTLA while standing by the still smoldering remains of the family home.

She said her father had experienced his fair share of fires over the decades.

“He was gathering some things, packing up his car a bit, and he said that he was going to gather up his stuff, but he said he was going to stay here too … he said that he felt this was going to pass over and that he would be here,” she said.

Kimiko Nickerson said her father bought the home in 1968 with a $5 down payment and raised his family there.

Erliene Kelley

When the Eaton fire began spreading Tuesday night, 83-year-old Erliene Kelley did not want to evacuate because previous fires had never reached her Altadena home.

“She was adamant about staying,” her granddaughter Briana Navarro told the Los Angeles Times. “My husband kept asking her if she was sure, if she didn’t want to come with us.”

After moving from Monmouth, Ill., Kelley and her late husband, Howard, bought their house in the late 1960s and raised two kids there. Navarro said she and her husband and two kids moved in with her grandmother after their grandfather’s death. Her father, who lives 10 minutes away, also tried to get her grandmother to leave, but she refused.

Navarro and her family as well as her father evacuated the area after receiving orders to do so. She kept in constant contact with her grandmother over text, she said.

The service cut out at one point, but her grandmother sent one last text to her father in the middle of the night saying she would be evacuated.

When her father went to check on their home the next day, nothing was left of their home but rubble. Police confirmed Friday that her grandmother had passed away.

Navarro did not respond to calls from The Associated Press seeking comment.

Firefighters have been battling some of the most destructive fires in Los Angeles history in recent days. The massive wildfires menacing the city from the east and west have turned entire neighborhoods to ash.

Numerous firefighting air tankers from throughout California are flying fire suppression missions as conditions allow, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (Cal Fire).

The specially equipped aircraft can steer or contain a fire’s perimeter, helping fire crews on the ground. We show here the types of aircraft available, from specially converted passenger jets to aircraft that can scoop water from a lake, and their specific roles.

Cal Fire has its own fleet of aircraft operating from 14 airfields and 11 helicopter bases across the state that can reach most fires within about 20 minutes. The three main components of the fleet are tactical planes, airtankers and helicopters. All have specific roles but work together as a unit to combat fires.

According to Cal Fire’s website, the fleet’s more than 60 planes and helicopters make it the largest department-owned fleet of aerial firefighting equipment in the world. But if extra resources are needed, the department hires additional planes on a contract basis and in extreme conditions, it can request help from the military.

Dozens of helicopters and multiple air tankers were involved in fighting the current fires, according to a Jan. 8 press release from Governor Gavin Newsom’s office.

Tactical planes

These aircraft are used in aerial command and control roles in fighting wildfires, providing tactical coordination with commanders on the ground and other aircraft in the sky. Most of Cal Fire’s tactical planes are North American Rockwell OV-10 aircraft.

The OV-10 Bronco is a twin-turboprop, multi-mission aircraft that served with the U.S. Navy, Marine Corps and Air Force until the 1990s. Cal Fire obtained 15 of the retired planes from the Department of Defense in 1993 and converted them for fire-fighting.

The map below shows some of the tactical flights around the Palisades Fire on Jan. 9. Flight path data from Flightradar24 shows how a Cal Fire OV-10 flew and a Pilatus PC-12 from Colorado’s Division of Fire Prevention and Control flew over the area.

The planes circled repeatedly around the fires for long periods of time. Unlike air tankers, which need to make repeated short runs to refill with water or fire retardant after a drop, the OV-10s can stay airborne for hours and can also act as lead planes when necessary to guide large tankers into drop zones.

Tanker planes

The workhorse of Cal Fire’s fleet is the Grumman S-2T tanker. The aircraft can hold about 4,500 liters (1,200 gallons) of fire retardant that it can drop in the path of fires. The planes are smaller than many air tankers and can be used in fast initial attacks on fires. The ex-military aircraft were used to track submarines until the 1970s.

The Grumman S-2T has a fill spout in the tail, allowing it to be “hot loaded” with retardant without having to shut off its engines. This means it can be back in the air within minutes. One S-2T can cycle through multiple times this way before it needs to be shut down and refueled.

Reload and return

Flight profile for one S-2T tanker through the course of the day on Jan. 9.

The short runs are evident in flight path data, again from Jan. 9. The map shows how the plane repeatedly loops around to the edge of the fire before returning to the air base.

Tankers don’t usually drop retardant directly on the fire itself. Instead, they let it go in front of a fire, directing its course or slowing its advance, and giving ground crews a chance to control or extinguish it. Retardant can also be released to protect homes or important sites and to keep access roads open.

Mega Tankers

Cal Fire operates large C-130 “Hercules” tankers and can also employ contractors to bring in Large Air Tankers (LATs) and Very Large Air Tankers (VLATs) to help suppress major fires. The aircraft are usually passenger jets that have been converted to tankers. Here are some of the tankers that have helped fight the fires in California in recent years.

The large air tankers can carry a much larger load than the smaller Cal Fire tankers. The diagram below shows how much retardant or water can be dropped by each type of aircraft.

Before its retirement in 2021, a converted Boeing 747, the world’s most easily recognized jetliner, with its humped fuselage and four engines, was the largest firefighting aircraft but has now ceased operations.

The aircraft’s pressurized system could dump about 68,000 liters (18,000 gallons) of retardant in a matter of seconds from as low as 60-90 meters (yards) above ground level.

The 747 supertanker took around 30 minutes to fill on the ground, longer than some other tankers and much more than the few minutes needed for the S-2T Cal Fire tankers. But the line of retardant that could be delivered to the ground in one run is significantly more effective than that of other tankers.

Guided drops

Some tankers require a “lead” aircraft to guide them in and show exactly where to drop retardant. Some large tankers come with their own lead aircraft and team, or Cal Fire’s tactical OV-10s can serve as lead aircraft.

All of the aircraft work in unison to fight the fires, many of them making multiple flights through the day, coordinated by Cal Fire OV-10 Broncos flying above for hours on end.

Aerial collaboration

An example of how multiple aircraft worked together to fight the LNU Lightning Complex fire, which devastated large parts of northern California in 2020. Chart shows flight profiles on August 22, 2020.

Super Scoopers

Firefighting “Super Scooper” planes refill by descending to the placid waters of bays and lakes and skimming the water’s surface to load their tanks. They then release the water to douse a blaze and repeat the process until they need to refuel.

According to flight tracking data from Flightradar24, two Canadian super scoopers made flights and dozens of repeated water scoops to tackle the Palisades Fire.

Helicopters

Cal Fire owns a fleet of helicopters including a number of Bell UH-1H “Super Hueys”, which can each carry about 1,200 litres (320 gallons) of water in buckets hanging below the aircraft. They can be used for fast initial attacks on smaller wildfires.

Their Sikorsky S70i Black Hawk helicopters are also able to drop water or fire retardant, as well as conduct night operations.

Flight tracking data from Jan. 9 shows a number of helicopters operating around the Palisades Fire, including Leonardo AW139 and Sikorsky S-76 aircraft.

The helicopters have also proven valuable when moving or evacuating firefighters and civilians. Cal Fire’s helicopter crews are trained to carry out “short-haul” rescues, which often involve a crew member being lowered from a hovering helicopter. Once hooked to a harness or basket, the target and crew member are carried a short distance to safety.

Winds dropped on Thursday from the 100-mph (160-kph) gusts seen earlier in the week, permitting the crucial aerial support for crews on the ground. But officials said winds intensified again overnight, and red flag conditions were expected until Friday afternoon.

Aircraft illustrations by

Marco Hernandez

Edited by

Daniel Grebler and Lisa Shumaker

Sources

California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (Cal Fire); Flightradar24; Fire Information for Resource Management System (FIRMS); GLAD (Global Land Analysis & Discovery); Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM); OpenStreetMap;

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