LOS ANGELES — A devastating wildfire that swept through Los Angeles on Jan. 7, killing at least 28 people and destroying over 16,000 buildings, has raised questions about the city's preparedness and water system infrastructure. The rapid spread of the fire, fueled by winds of up to 100 miles per hour, overwhelmed the water supply, leaving firefighters to battle the blaze with dwindling resources.
As the fire raged on, fire hydrants began to run dry, shocking residents and firefighters alike. "It's not just movie stars" who live in the affected areas, said Joan Zoloth, a resident who lost her family's home in the Palisades fire. "My parents scraped together to buy that home when I was six years old. It's a community of people who are not just wealthy, but also working-class families."
The water system's failure to keep up with the demand has sparked an investigation, with officials seeking to understand how the city's infrastructure could be improved to prevent such disasters in the future. According to water experts, the issue was not a lack of water supply, but rather the inability of the system to deliver water quickly enough to the areas where it was needed most. "Any domestic water supply is really made for turning a faucet on and brushing your teeth," said one expert. "A couple of structure fires, it's going to handle that. But when you have so many homes that are on fire, all of those different fire engines and firefighters that are pouring copious amounts of water at the same time deplete the tanks of water."
The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power has announced an investigation into the matter, and California Gov. Gavin Newsom and LA City Council members have called for a thorough examination of the events leading up to the fire. As the city begins to rebuild and recover, residents are left to wonder how such a disaster could have occurred, and what can be done to prevent it from happening again in the future.
As the immediate danger of the fires in Los Angeles subsides, attention has turned to the hunt for who to blame, and misinformation has spread like wildfire. The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has reactivated its rumor response site to combat false claims, and the Los Angeles Fire Department (LA Fire) has directly responded to inaccurate social media posts.
"It's inappropriately damaging," said an LA Fire representative. "It's inaccurate, it's misleading to the public, and it doesn't help develop appropriate responses for dealing with these crises."
President Trump, for instance, claimed that water shortages in LA were due to policies meant to protect an endangered fish, the Delta smelt. He signed an executive order, titled "Putting People Over Fish: Stopping Radical Environmentalism to Provide Water to Southern California," directing federal officials to find ways to override "disastrous" California water policies.
However, California Governor Gavin Newsom disputed this claim, stating, "It's just simply false. It's nonsense. There's lots of conversations about California water policy and how we allocate water to protect fish or ecosystems versus deliver water to different kinds of users. But that had no role whatsoever to play in water availability for firefighting."
Meanwhile, the owners of the Wonderful Company, which has sprawling farmlands in the San Joaquin Valley, have faced anti-Semitic attacks on social media, falsely accusing them of hoarding water due to their investment in a public-private water bank. However, experts have clarified that this water bank has no connection to LA's water supply, and the city's water issues are a localized problem of infrastructure and the scale and scope of the unprecedented confluence of events.
The fires have also resurfaced criticism around state and local water decisions, from taking down dams to not building enough reservoirs. However, experts point out that the real culprit is the lack of rainfall, with LA seeing close to zero rain since May. The year 2024 was the hottest on record for the entire planet, leading to increased demand for water by soils, vegetation, people, and agriculture, all of which are influenced by climate change.
The hard truth is that water failure could happen anywhere that's faced with fighting multiple fires at once. Oakland had a massive wildfire in the 1990s, and the water pressure was not up to the task of stopping the firestorm, resulting in the destruction of thousands of homes. Similar problems were encountered in Ventura County, where hydrants ran dry during two fires less than a year apart, each burning more than 1,000 homes.
Fire events of this magnitude are getting more likely to happen beyond California, too. Wildfires are a growing concern across the United States, with 45 million residences located in high-fire-risk areas, known as the wildland-urban interface. Cities in Texas, Colorado, and Oregon are among the top 15 cities at highest risk, and the wildfire season is getting longer and longer.
All this begs the question: could any water system handle a blaze that moves so fast? According to a fire expert, "We don't have any municipal water systems that can supply hundreds of hydrants all at the same time. Period. That doesn't exist."
However, there are solutions that can help. Mark Whaling, a retired LA County Battalion Chief, has invented a heli-hydrant, an automatically refilling open tank reserved for helicopters to dip from in high-fire-risk areas. This system reduces the length of flight times between water pickups and drops, making it a valuable asset in combating wildfires.
The city of Yorba Linda was the first to install a heli-hydrant in 2019, followed by another in 2021. John Decriscio, the former water district operations manager, noted that the heli-hydrant was used to knock down a fire in Chino Hills State Park.
To make water systems more resilient towards wildfires, experts recommend focusing on three elements: raw water, local infrastructure, and power. Yorba Linda has added a long-planned underground reservoir that relies on gravity, not pumps, to get water to homes and hydrants. The district has also added backup generators at pump stations following the Freeway Complex Fire in 2008.
Similar plans have been put in place in Ventura County after hydrants ran dry in the Thomas and Woolsey fires. San Francisco serves as the best example of a comprehensive solution, with hundreds of structures falling before the city implemented measures to mitigate the effects of wildfires.
As the threat of wildfires continues to grow, it's essential for communities to take proactive steps to prepare and mitigate the risks. By investing in solutions like heli-hydrants and improving water infrastructure, cities can reduce the likelihood of water failures and keep their residents safe.
As the city begins to rebuild and recover from the devastating Palisades Fire, the importance of a robust and reliable fire-suppression system cannot be overstated. The unique system developed in the aftermath of the 1906 earthquake and fire, which utilizes seawater and a network of underground cisterns, serves as a model for innovative solutions to fire prevention and mitigation.
While individual options, such as fire retardant gel and generator-powered pumps, can provide a measure of protection, it is clear that a comprehensive approach to fire safety requires a significant investment of resources. The development of high-tech solutions, including autonomous unmanned aircraft and water cannons, holds promise, but also comes with a hefty price tag.
Ultimately, the willingness of communities to come together and support investments in fire prevention and mitigation will be crucial in determining the effectiveness of these solutions. As one resident noted, "if we would all band together to support that, if it meant saving our community," the potential for creating safer, more resilient neighborhoods is vast.
As the city looks to the future, it is clear that a multi-faceted approach to fire safety, one that incorporates both individual and community-level solutions, will be essential in protecting lives and property. By learning from the past, embracing innovation, and working together, it is possible to create a safer, more resilient community for all. The question now is, will the city's residents and leaders be able to come together to make this vision a reality, and what will it take to make it happen? Only time will tell, but one thing is certain - the stakes have never been higher.
