Evacuation drill a near no-show

At 10 a.m. Saturday, police officers raced up the winding, narrow streets of Park Oak Drive in the Hollywood Hills, airing screeching sirens and shouting brush-fire evacuation orders over loudspeakers.

Yes, this was a large, highly organized drill to test the city’s capacity to evacuate a hillside neighborhood of 400 homes. Yes, nearly three months ago Griffith Park was ablaze in what could be the worst year for brush fires in many seasons. Yes, more than 250 firefighters, police officers and other city officials showed up ready to facilitate the mass exercise.

But no, no thank you, the vast majority of residents said when asked Saturday to take part in the voluntary drill. On a quiet, balmy morning, only about 40 people decided to fake-evacuate.

“I’m undressed!” shouted a woman from the top of a two-story home, after a police officer persistently knocked on her door. The woman didn’t leave her home.

“It was a very unpleasant way to start the day,” said pastry chef Sam Godfrey, 22, after the 10 a.m. siren woke him and he turned away a police officer asking him if he wanted to evacuate.

“It’s kind of disruptive,” said Godfrey, although he thought the drill was a good idea in theory.

Susan Swan, president of the Hollywood United Neighborhood Council, said some residents did leave their homes around the designated time. But they went shopping or out on errands. They didn’t realize they were also supposed to meet at the school evacuation center.

“I think they didn’t know the sign-in was so important,” she said, adding that residents appreciated the effort by fire officials.

During the May 8 Griffith Park fire, an emergency evacuation order for homes southeast of the park unfolded smoothly. The relatively wide and straight Los Feliz streets made for an easy escape.

Saturday’s goal was to test a more challenging neighborhood. The homes in the Hollywood Hills sit on narrow hillside roads with many dead-ends.

Delayed or poorly planned evacuations can be deadly. Many of the fatalities that occurred during the 1991 Oakland Hills fire and the 2003 Cedar fire in San Diego County occurred when residents were trying to escape.

But with no real flames roaring nearby, many Hollywood Hills residents in this neighborhood of million-dollar homes seemed to carry on with their Saturday chores.

Selma Cowan, 77, was returning home just as police began to sound the evacuation order, and was startled when she heard the loud police horn.

“It’s got me nervous,” said Cowan. “Unless it’s a real emergency, I don’t want to go.”

A few were eager to participate -- some leaving for the evacuation site even before police began knocking on doors.

“We should have one a year,” said Ken McCreight, 85, as he drove his wife, Norma, and neighbor Anita Atencio down to the school.

Los Angeles Fire Capt. William Wick was disappointed with the turnout at the school. He estimated that about 1,600 people live in the evacuation exercise area in the Oaks neighborhood, by Griffith Park, and he had hoped 400 would participate. Wick said he thought people would get into playacting during the drill, that the roads would be crowded.

“We thought there would be a flood of cars, and people yelling at the firemen, saying, ‘Hey, I need a car’ ... and people showing up at the evacuation center saying, ‘Oh, my dog is up there.’ ”

At several neighborhood meetings, residents had promised to participate. But when the call came, there ended up being more volunteers at the designated Cheremoya Avenue School evacuation site than participants.

The lack of involvement in this drill could put in doubt future plans to hold similar ones throughout the city, Wick said. Other exercises have been considered for Mount Washington and the northwest and northeast neighborhoods of the San Fernando Valley.

“We don’t want to tax our resources ... and spend taxpayers’ money if we’re getting very little bang for the buck,” Wick said.

--

ron.lin@latimes.com

For tips on planning for an emergency, go to www.lacity.org/epd/epd_nprep.htm