California fires live updates: Camp fire death toll at 86; 3 people still missing

California’s deadliest blaze on record has claimed 86 lives.

(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)

The death toll from the devastating Camp fire in Butte County, Calif., rose to 86 after an 80-year-old man died of his burn injuries, authorities said Tuesday.

Larry Smith of Paradise was burned Nov. 8 while attempting to put out flames that engulfed his car, the Butte County Sheriff’s Office said. He was flown to the UC Davis Firefighters Burn Institute Regional Burn Center, where he died Nov. 25.

Authorities also released the name of one other person who died in the blaze: Shirlee Teays, 90, of Paradise.

Of the 86 people killed, 52 have been identified. Three people are still missing.

A recovery team searches for human remains after the Camp fire.

(Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times)

The Butte County Sheriff’s Office on Monday released the names of three more victims who died in the Camp fire.

Authorities identified the following people and have notified their families:

1. Rafaela Andrade, 84, of Paradise
2. Don Shores, 70, of Magalia
3. Jean Forsman, 83, of Magalia

Of the 85 people killed in California’s deadliest blaze on record, 50 have been identified. Three people remain missing.

Firefighter Adan Rodriguez douses hot spots on Mulholland Drive last month.

(Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)

Los Angeles County coroner’s officials Monday identified a mother and son who died trying to escape flames in the destructive Woolsey fire.

Shoushan Baklayan, 82, and her son Anthony Noubar Baklayan, 57, died in a car Nov. 9 in the 33100 block of Mulholland Highway in Malibu, coroner’s officials said.

Authorities said that the younger Baklayan died of effects of thermal injuries; investigators have not determined a cause of death for his mother.

The two were among three people who died in the blaze. The third victim has not been identified.

The family released a statement through their spokesman, Brian Glicklich, in which they asked for privacy as they continue to grieve.

The blaze, which erupted Nov. 8, ripped through nearly 97,000 acres in Ventura and Los Angeles counties, destroying 1,500 structures.

Firefighters move heavy debris while searching for human remains at a destroyed residence 19 days after the Camp fire in Paradise, Calif.

(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)

The Butte County Sheriff’s Office has released the names of three more people who died in the Camp fire.

Sheriff’s officials said Wednesday that the remains of the following people had been identified and their relatives had been notified:

• Sally Gamboa, 69, Paradise
• Joy Porter, 72, Paradise
• Dennis Clark, 49, Paradise

California’s worst wildfire killed 85 people when it tore through Butte County on Nov. 8. Officials say 10 residents are still missing.

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Weeks after the Camp fire destroyed more than 18,000 structures in California’s Butte County, volunteers from search-and-rescue teams nationwide continue to look for human remains in the rubble.

The names of 10 more victims of the Camp fire were released Monday by the Butte County Sheriff’s Office, which has notified the next of kin.

• Helen Pace, 84, Paradise
• Gary Hunter, 67, Magalia
• Beverly Powers, 64, Paradise
• Sheila Santos, 64, Paradise
• Andrew Downer, 54, Paradise
• Lou Herrera, 86, Paradise
• TK Huff, 71, Concow
• Gordon Dise, 66, Chico
• James Garner, 63, Magalia
• Robert Duvall, 76, Paradise

California’s worst wildfire has killed 85 people, and 11 residents in the Northern California counties where the blaze tore through in early November are still missing.

Homes leveled by the Camp fire in Paradise, Calif.

(Noah Berger / Associated Press)

Authorities in Butte County revised the Camp fire death toll to 85 after investigators determined that, in three cases, human remains collected in multiple bags belonged to a single individual.

Butte County Sheriff Kory Honea said investigators had identified 43 victims.

For weeks, hundreds of searchers scoured 18,000 structures destroyed by the blaze looking for human remains, going over some areas more than once. Honea advised residents who head back to their neighborhoods in coming days to call the sheriff’s office if they find bones or bone fragments.

Investigators have accounted for all but 11 people reported missing in the wildfire.

Crews have been working to clear tree hazards on public roads, but urged residents to be cautious because they have not assessed private properties.

Over the last few weeks, some Paradise evacuees have made a Best Western hotel home. They didn’t know each other before the fire, though they lived in the same small town for years and frequented the same haunts.

They have formed a little community at the Corning hotel around the waffle maker during breakfast, passing one another in the elevator and lounging in the lobby,

Around the table, they trade stories of dodging embers and feelings of guilt. Together, they try to make sense of the tragedy that unites them.

They are among thousands of Paradise residents who fled their homes the day the fire started and have not been allowed to return since. There is growing frustration at the pace of getting people back to see what is left of their properties as well as longer-term shelter plans for those who lost their homes.

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As a series of rainstorms begins to move across the state, officials in areas recently scarred by wildfires are on high alert for potential mudslides and flash flooding.

The National Weather Service issued a warning of possible flash flooding in three counties in Northern California in advance of a storm expected to arrive late Wednesday.

Forecasters predict the second in a series of three storm systems this week could drop more than an inch of rain on the Camp fire burn area in Butte County; the Carr, Delta and Hirz fires burn areas in Shasta County; and the Mendocino Complex fire scar in Lake County.

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U.S. Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke returned to Paradise, Calif., on Monday, saying the cost of California’s worst fires would probably be in the billions and that care would have to be taken in rebuilding the city.

“When we rebuild, having a frank discussion whether it’s appropriate to rebuild every place is an important part of the equation,” he told the Associated Press in an interview.

Authorities are coming to terms with the possibility that the search for victims of the Camp fire might never be complete and that some human remains won’t ever be recovered.

“Is it possible that there could be a circumstance where someone was completely consumed by fire and therefore we wouldn’t have something that we could collect? I would say it is within the realm of possibility, unfortunately,” Butte County Sheriff Kory Honea said Monday.

“There’s nothing easy about this. This is just an unprecedented situation,” he added.

Read the latest here.

The first of three storm systems expected in wildfire-ravaged Butte County, Calif., dropped a smattering of rain Tuesday. Forecasters predicted about an inch of precipitation, saying the relatively weak system would sputter out by early Wednesday.

But a stronger storm will roll in late Wednesday, bringing with it the potential for debris flows and up to 3 inches of rain through Thursday night.

The Butte County Emergency Operations Center has prepared for the rain by clearing drainage culverts of debris, said Matt Gates, public information officer for the Paradise Police Department.

The California Conservation Corps also has been working on erosion-control measures for mountain slopes filled with fire-damaged pine and chaparral.

“Ash doesn’t absorb water, which complicates things,” Gates said.

A third storm could bring 2½ to 4 inches of rain to the charred region from Friday through Sunday.

“It’s the intensity that can cause debris flows,” said Eric Kurth, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service. “If the rain comes over time, there’s some opportunity for it to absorb or gradually run off. When we have rapid runoff, that’s when it can bring down entire hillsides.”

The soil in recently burned areas cannot absorb significant amounts of rainwater, so excessive precipitation can lead to fast-moving flows containing mud, debris and even trees and boulders. The devastation can be deadly and often comes without warning.

The rain is also expected to complicate the already challenging search for human remains among the rubble of the Camp fire.

Typically, crews scoop fire debris into a screen and sift it, looking for bone or bone fragments, but the ash and rain have mixed to form a clay-like substance, making the task nearly impossible. Officials have had to bring in water and gently wash away the clay to expose potential human remains in the charred mess.

A recovery team searches for human remains after the deadly Camp fire.

(Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times)

Butte County Sheriff Kory Honea on Monday released the names of 16 more people who died in the Camp fire.

The death toll from California’s worst fire jumped to 88, with 203 people still missing, officials said.

Authorities released the the latest of names after notifying the victims’ next of kin.

According to the Sheriff’s Office, they are:

1. Joyce Acheson, 78, of Paradise.
2. Carol Arrington, 88, of Paradise.
3. David Bradburd, 70, of Paradise.
4. Larry Brown, 72, of Paradise.
5. Joanne Caddy, 75, of Magalia.
6. Elizabeth Gaal, 80, of Paradise.
7. Richard Jay Garrett, 58, of Concow.
8. Evva Holt, 85, of Paradise.
9. Sara Magnuson, 75, of Paradise.
10. Joanne Malarkey, 90, of Paradise.
11. John Malarkey, 89, of Paradise.
12. Deborah Morningstar, 66, of Paradise.
13. Vernice Regan, 95, of Paradise.
14. Russel Stewart, 63, of Paradise.
15. Victoria Taft, 67, of Paradise.
16. David Young, 69, of Concow.

The names of six others who died in the fire were released last week.

Of the 88 dead, 54 have been tentatively identified.

Officials say a mountain lion tracked by researchers probably died in a wildfire that tore through Southern California communities and wilderness areas.

The Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area tweeted Monday that there’s been no signal from the GPS collar on the young mountain lion dubbed P-74 since Nov. 9. That’s the day the Woolsey fire swept into the central part of the Santa Monica Mountains northwest of Los Angeles.

P-74 was a male born last year.

Several other mountain lions and bobcats monitored by scientists in the area have been located.

The huge fire charred a swath of national park land that’s home to the big cats and popular among hikers, mountain bikers and horseback riders.

The blaze burned 1,600 structures in and around Malibu and left three people dead.

The death toll from California’s worst fire jumped to 88 on Monday with 203 people still missing, officials said.

Searchers have spent the last two weeks combing through the remains of Paradise, where much of the city was burned in the Camp fire.

Officials said Monday that they had covered a good portion of the city. It’s been a grim task, with most of the remains being found as just bones or bone fragments.

The fire, which burned more than 14,000 homes in the Paradise region, was fully contained Sunday morning.

A new rainstorm will move into the area in the coming days, and officials are worried that could make search efforts more difficult.

Officials say a mountain lion tracked by researchers probably died in a wildfire that tore through Southern California communities and wilderness areas.

The Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area tweeted Monday that there’s been no signal from the GPS collar on the young mountain lion dubbed P-74 since Nov. 9. That’s the day the Woolsey fire swept into the central part of the Santa Monica Mountains northwest of Los Angeles.

P-74 was a male born last year.

Several other mountain lions and bobcats monitored by scientists in the area have been located.

The huge fire charred a swath of national park land that’s home to the big cats and popular among hikers, mountain bikers and horseback riders.

The blaze burned 1,600 structures in and around Malibu and left three people dead.

As of Sunday night, the number of people missing stands at 296 in California’s worst wildfire on record.

The Butte County Sheriff’s Department said the death toll was at 85. Searchers spent the day looking for remains in the Paradise area, where 14,000 homes were lost in the Camp fire.

The number of missing has been going down as officials connect with people whose names are on the list. As of last week, it topped 1,000.

At the Ridgewood mobile home park for senior citizens in Paradise on Sunday, more than 100 search and rescue workers in white jumpsuits and gas masks combed through the rubble with shovels and rakes.

The surrounding pine trees were singed, ringing a neighborhood where every home had been reduced to charred, twisted wreckage.

Last week, searchers found the remains of two people there, said Sgt. Dave Thompson of the Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office.

On Sunday, the grim, painstaking task yielded some bones, including those of two small dogs. But none were human.

The searchers, many of whom are volunteers, also found a safe full of coins as they combed through Ridgewood and Ponderosa Mobile Estates next door.

“We’re going trailer by trailer, piece by piece, turning it over for anything that looks human,” said Thompson, who led an operation that drew searchers from counties such as Marin, Contra Costa, Shasta and Kern, as well as the National Guard and California Conservation Corps.

Facebook photos before the fire of the Ridgewood community at Pentz and Wagstaff roads, where residents were 55 years and older, showed tidy mobile homes with well-kept gardens.

The fire came over the ridge very fast, and senior citizens with limited mobility could have had trouble fleeing, Thompson said.

As teams wrapped up their work, Thompson dispatched them to other neighborhoods to continue searching for people who lost their lives in the fire.

Operations at disaster assistance centers in Malibu and Agoura Hills have been extended to keep helping residents affected by the Woolsey fire.

The centers, located at the former Malibu Courthouse and the Conrad N. Hilton Foundation in Agoura Hills, are scheduled to be open through Dec. 8. Hours of operation are between 1 to 8 p.m. from Monday to Thursday, and 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Friday and Saturday.

At the centers, residents affected by the fire can get help filing insurance claims and applying for assistance from the Federal Emergency Management Agency. They can also receive advice on how to clean up, repair and rebuild their properties.

The Woolsey fire destroyed 1,643 structures as it swept through Oak Park and Ventura County and into Malibu, according to a final report released Sunday.

That makes it one of the most destructive fires in Southern California history, though it pales in comparison to the 14,000 homes lost in the Camp fire in Butte County.

Hundreds of evacuees from the Malibu, Agoura Hills and Thousand Oaks areas spent the holiday weekend returning to their burned-out neighborhoods to survey their damaged or destroyed homes and to begin rebuilding their lives. Some were still debating whether to stay or leave.

The Woolsey fire scorched more than 96,000 acres and left three people dead before it was fully contained on Thanksgiving Day, fire officials said.

Pono Barnes, a spokesman for the Los Angeles County Fire Department, said firefighters are working on encouraging residents to prepare for winter rainstorms that could move over the burn area.

“The whole landscape in the area has changed,” Barnes said. “The vegetation that was there to hold the ground together was burned off.”

Light rains in the area have assisted firefighters in achieving 100% containment of Northern California’s devastating Camp fire, but most evacuations and road closures remain in effect. More than 1,000 firefighters remain on site, assisting with search and recovery efforts.

Full containment came as a big relief for fire officials, who noted that the rain sped up the process. Full containment was originally projected for Nov. 30.

“We didn’t get mudslides, so that was good,” said Brigitte Foster, fire prevention officer for the Lassen National Forest and spokeswoman for fire officials regarding the Camp fire. “We got enough to hamper down on the fire.”

The rains also gave officials the ability to reduce the number of fire personnel on duty and allow some to go home for the holiday weekend.

“We still have plenty of resources out there to work from the containment line and make sure there are no smoldering spots along the edge,” Foster said. “We still have search and rescue teams working in the area.”

And in preparation for residents being allowed to return to burn areas and assess property damage, crews were helping clear roadways and remove hazardous materials such as trees that could fall down. It’s unknown when evacuees will be able to return.

There are concerns about another storm approaching burn areas this week.

Rain is expected to move into the Camp fire burn areas beginning Tuesday and continue through the end of the week, according to the National Weather Service. Up to 3 inches could fall in some lower elevations, forecasters said. On Wednesday, the same system is expected to deliver a half-inch to 2 inches in burn areas in Southern California.

Along Trancas Canyon Road on Saturday, a woman snapped photos of the blackened wreckage of what was once an alcohol and drug treatment center. A wedge of scorched wall stood at a tilt, like a listing ship, peering over the Pacific below. Someone had taped business cards to a wall bordering the site, advertising a restoration business, but it was hard to imagine what could be restored.

The woman, who declined to give her name, said she had been sober nearly seven months. “This place saved my life,” she said.

She stayed in Newbury Park after she was evacuated, and it was the first time she had gotten a moment to see what had become of Creative Care Inc. There were people she had gotten to know there who are now living out of state and wanted photos. “It’s sad,” she said. “But it’s just material.

“I have sobriety. I have life,” she said. “And they’ll rebuild.”

Read more here.

Across Butte County — a primarily agricultural area known for its walnut, almond and rice farms — towns are struggling to absorb the roughly 50,000 people displaced by the Camp fire. Through no fault of their own, the evacuees’ arrival has worsened the state’s housing crisis and raised the possibility that they could be evicted from the region again, not by fire but by a scarcity of suitable dwellings.

Hotels and motels from Sacramento to Redding are full. The vacancy rate in the rental market, which hovered around 3% before the fire, has fallen to near zero. Unable to find single-family homes in the area, evacuees have resorted to renting individual bedrooms, buying recreational vehicles and purchasing travel trailers. Others are simply leaving California for other Western states with a lower cost of living.

Read more here.

The worst fire in California history reached full containment Sunday morning, a milestone for a catastrophic inferno that killed at least 85 people with nearly 250 people still missing weeks later.

The Camp fire is now 100% contained, California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection said Sunday, after burning nearly 14,000 homes and consuming 153,000 acres in and around Paradise in Butte County.

Much of Paradise was lost in the fire, and search and rescue crews will continue looking through the ruins for more victims.

At one point, there were more than 1,300 people listed as missing from the fire. But that number has been dropping in recent days. Over the weekend, it declined from more than 400 to 249 as officials were able to confirm more people on the list were actually alive.

Several days of rain last week helped firefighters get a handle on the fire.

Authorities expect the removal of ash and other toxic debris from the fire will be the largest such effort ever undertaken by state officials.

The amount of debris is expected to dwarf the cleanup effort undertaken from last year’s Northern California fires. That effort led to more than 2 million tons of toxic debris removed from 6,000 properties in seven California counties: Sonoma, Napa, Lake, Mendocino, Butte, Yuba and Nevada, said Eric Lamoureux of the Governor’s Office of Emergency Services.

County, state and federal governments jump start the process of removal of toxic ash and other debris, and can do so at no cost to the owner, Lamoureux said. Typically, about 80% of owners give the government permission to conduct the cleanup operations, with the rest opting to do it themselves.

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As this region still reels from the worst fire in California history, educators are faced with the challenging task of reopening schools even as the firefighters continue their work and searchers scour the area for more victims.

They are working to identify replacement classroom space for schools that were burned to ashes during the fire.

Paradise Unified School District was hardest hit, with multiple school buildings lost to the fires. Charter schools in the area also suffered.

Read more here.

The worst fire in California remained 95% contained Saturday morning.

Rains helped put out the flames but also made it harder for firefighters to access some areas.

“The fireline that remains uncontained is located in steep and rugged terrain where it is unsafe for firefighters to access due to the heavy rains,” CalFire said in a statement.

With the rain passing, officials hope to intensify search and rescue efforts, with more than 400 still reported missing.

The fire burned 153,336 acres and nearly 14,000 homes, with 84 dead.

In Malibu, some residents who evacuated from the Woolsey fire were still waiting to return home as officials worked to restore utilities and road access. That fire, which charred 96,949 acres and destroyed 1,643 structures, is 100% contained. Three people were killed.

“There is still a lot of work to be done,” said Los Angeles County Fire Department spokesman Pono Barnes. “Strike teams are in the area helping residents repopulate.”

Firefighters’ biggest job Friday was working with Southern California Edison and Southern California Gas Co., Barnes said.

“There was quite a bit of infrastructure damaged during the burn,” he said. “Edison is working to replace downed power lines and burned-out power poles.”

As many as 2,000 power poles have been replaced, he said.

“That is why we still have some evacuations in place,” Barnes added.

The grim search for victims continued in Paradise on Saturday amid the rain.

Times photographer Gina Ferazzi was struck by the image of an abandoned wheelchair and gurney in front of the destroyed Cypress Meadows post-acute medical facility.

“The rain is making the devastation in Paradise even more eerie and sad,” she wrote.

A new federal report found that climate change is taking an increasing toll on communities across the United States. It projects widespread and growing devastation as increasing temperatures, rising sea levels, worsening wildfires, more intense storms and other cascading effects harm our ecosystems, infrastructure and society.

Among the findings: The area burned across the western U.S. from 1984 to 2015 was twice what it would have been if climate change had not occurred, according to analyses cited in the report.

“Earth’s climate is now changing faster than at any point in the history of modern civilization, primarily as a result of human activities,” the report says. “But the severity of future impacts will depend largely on actions taken to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and to adapt to the changes that will occur.”

The report comes as California faces a series of devastating wildfires that have claimed scores of lives and burned thousands of homes.

Read more on the report here.

With many of their homes damaged or destroyed in the state’s most devastating wildfire on record, the students of Paradise High School face an uncertain future.

On Tuesday, a man they have never met from a city more than 500 miles away will give them a gift he hopes will provide at least a small measure of security, support and comfort in a dark hour.

Rancho Santa Fe businessman Bob Wilson plans to personally deliver a $1,000 check to each of the school’s 980 students and 105 employees in Chico at a venue that has yet to be determined. That’s a total of $1 million for the wildfire victims to use as they see fit, no strings attached.

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Firefighters battling California’s deadliest fire on record continued to make progress Friday, with containment growing to 95% and the number of homes burned at nearly 14,000.

The Camp fire has scorched more than 153,000 acres and killed at least 84 people in Butte County, according to California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection officials. But hundreds of residents are still missing, and thousands more have been displaced by the massive blaze.

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Rain falls Thursday on the site of a home destroyed by the Camp fire.

(Justin Sullivan / Getty Images)

Another day of searching, another grim finding.

The death toll from the Camp fire rose by one Thursday to 84, on a day when rain seemed to halt further growth of the state’s deadliest blaze.

By Thursday evening, the Jarbo Gap, where the fire probably started, had received just over an inch of rain in the preceding 24 hours, according to the National Weather Service. Rain totals varied across the region.

The forecast calls for more.

In the nearby town of Paradise, which was nearly obliterated by the fire, the forecast for Thursday night was more showers, heavy at times, with winds of 18 to 24 mph and gusts as high as 37 mph.

Such winds would have fueled the fire just days ago, but instead they are harbingers of precipitation that is expected to drop three-quarters of an inch to 1 inch of rainfall Thursday night.

Another 1 to 2½ inches could fall Friday.

The wet weather has helped bring containment of the fire to an estimated 95% as of Thursday evening. But it also brought damp, chilly discomfort to evacuees living in tents — thousands of residents have been displaced — and new worries about potentially deadly mudslides in burned areas. A flash-flood watch and wind advisory will remain in effect until 4 p.m. Friday.

The rain also complicates the search for human remains, which could be washed away. Hundreds of people are still unaccounted for.

Crews also are involved in another grim tally, figuring out exactly which homes and business burned. Officials have released a preliminary interactive map that shows the damage, house by house.

Camp fire evacuees now have rain to contend with as they occupy tents in a Walmart parking lot in Chico, Calif.

(Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times)

Schools in Malibu survived the Woolsey fire almost intact but they got very dirty, and cleanup efforts will keep campuses closed even as residents are allowed to return to their properties.

The fire killed three people, burned 97,000 acres and destroyed 1,500 structures. Malibu’s four schools have been closed since Nov. 9, when they were included in the mandatory evacuation zones.

The tentative date to reopen Webster Elementary is Nov. 28. Point Dume Marine Science School is scheduled to reopen Dec. 3. Juan Cabrillo Elementary School should be ready between Dec. 3 and Dec. 5, pending results of air testing inside and outside for traces of lead, asbestos and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs). Malibu High will be back in business between Dec. 4 and Dec. 10

The district had planned a swifter reopening but slowed down out of an abundance of caution, spokeswoman Gail Pinsker said.

“We are hearing from parents that they want thorough cleaning and testing, which we plan, but the cleaning and testing and waiting for results take a day to more than a week,” she said.

Three other districts in the region also had closed campuses. Schools in Conejo Valley Unified, Oak Park Unified and Las Virgenes Unified are aiming to reopen Monday.

Residents who had to evacuate included Las Virgenes Supt. Daniel Stepenosky, who estimated that about 90 families with district students lost their homes, as did two staff members.

In a video update on social media, he said that everyone is eager for schools to reopen: “Everyone wants to get back to a state of normalcy, to be honest with you.”

To that end, a crew of 200 has been working for several days, and the district had brought in 300 air scrubbers and 300 hydroxyl deodorizers. Playgrounds that are not ready by Monday will be cordoned off.

Stepenosky said that a “full-court press” will continue because “the schools are really boring when they’re empty.”

Times photographer Marcus Yam shared on Twitter a very personal photo essay about the victims of Paradise.

“This #thanksgiving we should to take a moment for the victims of the #CampFire,” he wrote. “So many families will not be spending #Thanksgiving in the comfort of their own homes. Take a moment to think about them.

Read the whole thread here.

Camp fire victims have a Thanksgiving dinner in Chico, Calif.

(Justin Sullivan / Getty Images)

Anna Longacre booked her flight home months ago.

Back then, the 26-year-old Army sergeant imagined the comforts that awaited her Thanksgiving week, the things that never change no matter how far away from Paradise, Calif., the military takes her.

The old cast-iron stove that warmed the entire house during winter. The small stone-fruit orchard that ran along the side and back. Her dad’s breakfast hash browns.

Anna’s family had lived on their 3-acre lot in the Sierra Nevada foothills for 20 years. She moved away at 18 and has been stationed in Afghanistan, South Korea and Kansas.

But her heart stayed in Paradise.

Instead of being home Thanksgiving morning, she found herself in a cavernous auditorium at Cal State Chico, where turkey and fixings had been prepared for evacuees of California’s deadliest and most destructive wildfire.

She dragged her dad, Bruce, with her. She wanted to get him out of her grandma’s house in Chico, where they’d been staying with her mom and dogs. And she had heard celebrity chefs Guy Fieri and José Andrés were making the food. It couldn’t hurt to try and have a little fun, she thought, despite everything.

The father and daughter were greeted by volunteers in plush turkey hats and handed sanitary wipes at the door.

Read more here.

A young Camp fire evacuee waits in line to receive a free Thanksgiving meal Thursday in Chico, Calif.

(Justin Sullivan / Getty Images)

As of Thanksgiving Day, the devastation logged by the Camp fire in Northern California was nearly 14,000 homes, more than 150,000 acres and at least 83 lives.

Some of the thousands displaced by the fire, mostly from the town of Paradise, said they nonetheless counted themselves among the lucky and found things to be grateful for this Thanksgiving.

Times reporters on the ground in Butte County asked people about the meaning of this holiday.

Here are their stories.

California’s costs to fight two deadly wildfires that ignited less than two weeks ago have already topped $118 million — a sizable financial hit to a program that needed an unexpected cash infusion just two months ago.

Cal Fire officials said Tuesday that $589.7 million has been paid out by the state’s fire emergency, or “e-fund,” account since July 1. Officials are poised to free up additional dollars before lawmakers consider a new state budget early next year.

Read more here.

Butte County Dist. Atty. Mike Ramsey warned that scam artists are targeting Paradise fire victims seeking to rent housing.

“We have seen people who have no right to a particular apartment that go and rent out that apartment and take people’s money. Be very careful. Red flag: If it’s too good to be true, it is,” Ramsey said.

Another scam already happening are fraudulent GoFundMe websites seeking contributions for fire victims, he said. “We encourage folks to go to the Butte County website to take a look at areas where you can legitimately and safely give your charitable dollars to,” he said.

He also urged residents to beware of scammers seeking to collect personal information under the guise of pretending to be insurance agents or a sheriff’s deputy seeking to cross names off the list of the missing. “It will be obvious that these are scammers,” he said. “Be very, very careful of giving any sort of personal information that will be financially disastrous to you,” he said.

There have been 11 cases of looting, he said, with suspects mostly interested in vehicles, such as motor homes, left behind by fire victims that fled.

Rapid DNA analysis is being used to identify dozens of California fire victims burned beyond recognition. Of 83 victims, sheriff’s officials have made tentative identifications on 58 of them, but they await DNA confirmation.

“We’re working diligently to identify those individuals so that we can contact their next of kin and notify them,” said Butte County Sheriff Kory Honea.

It used to be that DNA analysis could take months before answers would firm up, but now DNA analysis can be done within a matter of hours, Jim Davis of Ande, a Massachusetts-based company that specializes in rapid DNA analysis, said at a press conference in Chico on Wednesday.

Davis said his company has been asked by the sheriff to use its rapid DNA analysis method to help identify victims in a mass casualty incident the first time his company has been asked to do so for this purpose.

Davis said he’s working with the coroner’s office in Sacramento County to collect tissue samples from the autopsies of the deceased; 80% of the time, those samples are usable for DNA analysis. Butte County sheriff and California Department of Justice officials are coordinating the collection of DNA samples from living relatives.

The rains in Northern California have finally improved the air quality.

Smoke from the Camp Fire had brought unhealthful air quality to the Bay Area and Sacramento Valley for more than a week.

A second storm was moving into Northern California tonight, with rain in the forecast Friday.

Tamra Gray’s Facebook friends have started posting photos of their newly decorated Christmas trees. When she stumbles upon this display of normalcy, she can barely hold it together.

“It’s hard to think about the holidays right now,” she said as she sat at a table in the Chico Mall food court, where she and her husband were discussing their options with a home insurance company representative. “I don’t have a home to put a tree in right now.”

Gray and her husband, Scott, lived in their Paradise home on Oak Way for 20 years. What she will miss the most are the pine trees in her backyard and the cool shade they provided, a simple pleasure she could count on even when the mercury hit 100.

At 10 a.m. on the day of the fire, Gray’s 19-year-old son, Dylan, came running down the street. He had gotten stuck in gridlock traffic on Wagstaff Road, and seeing the plumes of black smoke ahead of him, he ditched his car in the closest parking lot and darted home, the only one he’s ever known. “There’s a fire, we gotta get out,” he shouted. They had not received an evacuation alert.

Gray did not think the house would burn. They lived a block from a fire station. Before leaving, she touched a redwood keepsake box that contained her children’s first teeth. “If I take this to a shelter, it could get stolen,” she thought. She left it.

The family also left three dogs behind, taking several others with them in separate cars. Gray’s thinking was this: if there was looting, the big dogs would protect the home. Gray found the animals’ remains when she returned to Paradise last week. She is consumed by guilt.

Gray and her family -- four adults and two kids -- are staying in an RV as they search for a rental. Her 29-year-old daughter, Shannon, also lost her home in Magalia.

“I feel lost. I just feel so homesick and I can’t seem to get past that yet,” Gray said, tearing up. “It’s hard for me to think about where I want to be in the future.”

Just as she was being asked what she was grateful for on the eve of Thanksgiving, Gray’s teenage daughter, Victoria, bounded up to her in the food court with several shopping bags in her hand.

“I got you shoes,” Victoria said, pulling out a pair of gray Champion slip-ons. “They were on sale.”

Gray tugged off one of the brown Ugg boots she got at a shelter. She tried on a sneaker.

“I’m grateful that my family made it out alive,” Gray said, returning to the question. “It’s easy to answer that when it’s staring me right in the face. It’s when I’m alone that I go into a dark place.”

They called it their little green house in the forest. A two-bedroom mobile home with a birdbath out front on Skyway road where deer and bobcats roamed.

It is likely gone, they think, because they have seen a map of the burn area — a cloud of red over where they lived for four years.

Steve Weathington, 67, and his girlfriend, Irene Schwab, 65, now lay their heads on green cots in an exhibit hall at the Yuba-Sutter Fairgrounds. Their possessions are few, but they made it out with their two trucks, two dogs and two cats. A fortune, they know, compared with what others escaped with.

The morning the fire broke out, the couple had sat down to waffles and eggs when they noticed the sky was a smoky orange. Schwab went outside to settle a patio umbrella that was thrashing in the wind. A manager of their mobile home park had begun driving around, honking.

Grabbing clothes, toiletries, medicine and the animals, Weathington hopped into his truck. Schwab followed behind in hers.

“It was burning on both sides of the road,” Schwab recalled. “You could feel the heat from the flames.” It took them more than three hours to get to Chico, usually a 25-minute drive.

They are grateful to be alive, to have had insurance on their home, to be capable and willing to start somewhere new. They may stay and find a place in Yuba City, a community they’ve grown to appreciate. When they venture out of the shelter, an act of kindness is usually bestowed upon them. Waitresses have bought them dinner, a barber refused money for a haircut. They have picked out clothes for free and marveled over the donations that file in daily.

“We get a little teary-eyed because it’s really emotional,” said Weathington, a retired commercial painter and U.S. Marines veteran, his eyes growing red.

Still, the timing of everything is hard to take. The couple used to host Thanksgiving dinner for family with a spread of traditional fare, including pumpkin cheesecake and homemade biscuits. The holiday rings a bit hollow now, eliciting memories of what they once had.

Firefighters continued to make progress with California’s deadliest fire, with containment rising to 90% but with number of homes burned now at nearly 14,000.

At least 83 people were killed when the fire swept into Paradise two weeks ago, and hundreds are still missing,

Rain helped firefighters, but the weather has made the search for victims more difficult.

“Precipitation has minimized fire activity and all fire lines continue to hold. Firefighters and resources continue to be deployed throughout the fire area to patrol and remove hazards,” Cal Fire said Thursday morning.

The remains of two more people were recovered in the Camp fire burn zone Wednesday, raising the death toll in the blaze to 83.

One person was found in a structure in Paradise, while the other was located in a structure in Magalia, Butte County Sheriff Kory Honea told reporters at a news conference.

“We’re working diligently to identify those individuals so we can contact their next of kin and notify them,” Honea said, adding that investigators have tentatively identified 58 of the dead.

Authorities have identified six more people who died in the blaze. They are:

• Teresa Ammans, 82, of Paradise
• Richard Brown, 74, of Concow
• Marie Wehe, 78, of Concow
• Kimber Wehr, 53, of Paradise
• Joseph Rabetoy, 39, of Paradise
• Joan Tracy, 80, of Paradise

About 830 searchers will work on Thanksgiving to look for victims of the blaze, though the search could be suspended if rain triggers mudflows in the area.

The number of people unaccounted for dropped to 563. A total of 2,052 people have been crossed off the missing-persons list.

“That’s a dynamic list,” Honea said. “You may see it go up or down depending on the information we receive during the course of the day.”

The blaze has scorched more than 153,000 acres and destroyed more than 18,000 structures, including 13,500 single-family homes. It was 85% contained.

The heavy rain has minimized fire activity.

“That fire activity is almost nothing,“said Josh Bischof of the California Dept. of Forestry and Fire Protection. Forecasters expect six inches of rain to fall across the burn area through Friday.

Butte County Dist. Atty. Michael Ramsey said his office has put together a team to deal with price gouging.

“People are not allowed to jack up prices more than 10% of what they were before the fires,” he said, adding that people can call (866) 323-6283 to report price gouging.

(Ruben Vives / Los Angeles Times)

Rain began to pound on the tent city of Paradise evacuees Wednesday afternoon in Chico, causing more problems for people who have already been through so much.

Two women walked around holding a blanket, offering it to anyone who needed it. Standing alone, wearing a red hooded rain poncho, John Owens shivered.

“I don’t know how much longer people can hang on like this,” he said.

Owens lost his home and car in the fire. He said he was clinging on to what he had left: his wife, his dog and a part-time manufacturing job.

“I told my boss I can’t hang here for too long,” he said. “If it’s going to be like this, I won’t last long. I’ll have to quit my job and go to the shelter.”

Owens said he said he hasn’t left because transportation to his job is best from where he is now. He said he has to commute between Chico and Yuba City.

“This stinks,” he said.

Despite the cold, wet weather that is coming down on him and others, Owens said he’s grateful to be alive.

“You only got a short period of time on this place,” he said, referring to Earth. “You gotta have a good time.”

In Chico, where thousands of evacuees have gathered, it’s going to be a Thanksgiving like no other. Some people who had been living in tents at a Walmart parking lot began to move on, some going to shelters.

Volunteers have also been out in force to help.

Sierra Nevada Brewing Co. in Chico has been prepping a Thanksgiving meal that will feed about 2,000 people.

The event is in conjunction with other groups who are putting together meals and it includes Cal State Chico and World Central Chicken.

The meal will consist of turkey, pork, green beans, mashed potatoes and gravy. The meals will be served in waves starting at 11 a.m., then at 1 p.m., 3 p.m. and 5 p.m.

Leslie Jessee, 33, tore sheets of foil and laid them in a stack as she prepped the turkey.

She said she hopes the Thanksgiving meal will bring some sense of peace for the people affected by the fire.

Nearby, Ken Grossman, the owner of the beer company, worked on making the gravy.

“On Thanksgiving I always make the turkey, the gravy and mashed potatoes for a big family,” he said. “This time, it’s a bigger family.”

Grossman said about 40 of his employees lost homes to the Camp fire. He also has friends who have lost so much.

“Hopefully family and friends will enjoy the meal,” he said.

With the public still prohibited from entering the worst-hit areas of Paradise and Magalia, the towns were silent, save for the hum of generators.

The gas station was shuttered. Ponderosa Elementary School abandoned. The blackened husks of cars were still visible across the town. At the site of a gym on Pentz Road, all that remained were the contorted remains of elliptical machines atop a pile of ash.

Crews worked on repairing utility lines, forcing motorists to just one side of many roads, and continued the process of looking for any signs of human remains, despite the rain.

“They’re looking for basically bone fragments. And they’re just systematically going from burned house to burned house, looking to see if there’s anything,” said Capt. Matt Bergstrand of the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection station in Magalia.

A day earlier, a hearse was spotted in Paradise, accompanied by the California Highway Patrol.

At the fire station in Magalia, things are still “pretty devastating,” Bergstrand said. “We’re just trying to get back to normal, whatever normal really is.… I don’t know what normal is really going to entail. A pretty big chunk of our area has been consumed.”

Nicole Padilla, 17, of Diamond Bar feeds Stanley the giraffe at the L.A. County Fair.

( (Francine Orr/ Los Angeles Times))

The saga of Stanley the giraffe continues as yet another celebrity has made the animal’s welfare her mission despite his keeper’s assurances.

Fitness celebrity Jillian Michaels is demanding that Malibu Wine Safaris move Stanley to a better home. In a letter to founder Dakota Semler, Michaels said that despite the Woolsey fire’s passing, the giraffe remains in danger as long as it is in on their property.

Celebrities and tourists have visited Saddlerock Ranch’s safari attraction for years to drink wine and snap selfies with the lone giraffe. But after the Woolsey fire, they used their clout to draw attention to the animal’s safety as the Woolsey fire roared toward the property.

They and hundreds of nearby residents, strangers and animal lovers believed Stanley had been abandoned when Malibu Wine Safaris staff evacuated.

A photo of the exotic animal on an open field with flames in the distance circulated on social media. Despite multiple statements made by the company, some people remained dubious.

Due to the short notice given to area residents, the animals were not evacuated; instead, they were placed in an open dirt field that did not have much fuel to burn.

“Stanley is doing fine,” said Bob Dunn after the fire passed through. Dunn, a close family friend who has helped care for the giraffe since its birth, said Stanley was “completely safe. He’s healthy.”

Although many have moved on, Michaels isn’t satisfied.

“Like millions of others, I saw and cannot shake off the picture of Stanley that showed flames approaching behind him, and I urge you not to keep him in the same path of danger,” Michaels wrote. “But fire or no fire, he needs to be moved to a place where he can thrive and he’s not just waiting for the monotony of his life to be broken when someone offers him a treat.”

Michaels is backed by the animal rights group PETA, which has been working to identify alternate homes for the animals, should the Semlers comply with Michaels’ request.

“Giraffes’ special needs simply cannot be met at a roadside zoo like this,” Michaels said in the letter, “and if he hasn’t already, he will soon begin to exhibit neurotic behavior resulting from captivity-related stress, frustration, and privation.”

Rebecca Smudzinski, a wildlife specialist with PETA, said young male giraffes like Stanley often travel in “bachelor herds” and roam large savannas. One in captivity is likely to display signs of stress, such as repetitive licking and pacing.

“The Woolsey fire exposed Stanley’s sad, lonely life in that barren enclosure,” she said. “He’s got nowhere to go and nothing to do, and so he just waits for people to feed him.”

Organizations housing exotic animals are required to have a permit from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which follows minimal standards set by the Animal Welfare Act. The permit includes an annual inspection visit to ensure the animal is taken care of properly. But that isn’t enough, Smudzinski maintained.

PETA wants the animal to be moved somewhere accredited by the Global Federation of Animal Sanctuaries or the Association of Zoos and Aquariums, which both require disaster plans to be reviewed and practiced regularly, she said.

Michaels referenced Safari West in a Twitter post as an example of an organization that successfully saved exotic animals.

Nancy Lang, co-owner of Safari West, said the organization was accredited by the Association of Zoos and Aquariums and the California Department of Fish and Wildlife. The staff there meet annually with law enforcement, the Humane Society and others to discuss disaster plans and practice regular drills, and partner with organizations that offer their facilities in case of emergencies.

When the Tubbs fire approached their property in 2017, they had little time to react, making an evacuation impossible. Lang said whether Malibu Wine Safaris did the right thing is impossible to say without knowing their circumstance.

Some of Safari West’s animals were also placed in an open field with little fuel to burn.

It’s unclear what disaster plan Malibu Wine Safaris had in place, but its staff only had a couple of hours to act. Malibu Wine Safaris did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

Butte County health officials are urging residents not to try to move back into homes damaged by the Camp fire in Paradise.

Some residents have been allowed back into Paradise to survey their homes and collect any valuables still left.

“There is evidence from recent fires in California that homes and property destroyed by fire contain high and concerning levels of heavy metals, lead, mercury, dioxin, arsenic, and other carcinogens. Some property may have the presence of radioactive materials,” the county said in a statement. “Exposure to hazardous substances may lead to acute and chronic health effects, and may cause long-term public health and environmental impacts.”

If the expected rainfall on the eve of Thanksgiving day is intense enough, areas where the Woolsey fire burned would be more susceptible to mud flows than areas affected by the Camp fire, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

USGS researchers created a map that shows the probability that different fire-affected areas will experience mud flows if there’s a storm that produces 24 millimeters of rain per hour, or a quarter of an inch in 15 minutes.

“We have historical information about where debris flows occurred, how big they were and the rainfall associated with triggering those events,” said Dennis Staley, a research geologist with the USGS. The model also considers slope steepness, topography and fire severity.

The dark red portions of the map indicate between an 80 and 100% chance of debris flows if rain reaches the assigned threshold for the map. Most areas affected by the Camp fire are colored yellow, indicating a 20% chance or less of debris flow. The Woolsey fire area on the other hand is mostly colored orange and red.

The reason for the higher probability, Staley said, is that areas affected by the Woolsey fire are steeper than where the Camp fire burned.

However, weather experts say rainfall in Southern California likely won’t be intense enough for dangerous mud flows. Rich Thomas, with the National Weather Service, said there will only be about quarter to three quarters of an inch of rainfall total.

There’s only a 10 to 20% chance the rain will become heavy enough to create mudflows, he said.

”There could be some minor debris flows, but nothing significant,” he said. “Rocks over the roadway, stuff like that.”

Still, Thompson said people should be prepared and pay attention to local authorities for evacuation orders.

To the west, the area affected by the Mendocino Complex fire appears to be at higher risk, Staley said. In August, the Mendocino Complex fire consumed more than 450,000 acres, becoming the largest wildfire in state history.

The area’s steep terrain made it a challenge to firefighters and also increases the likelihood of mud flows.

Heavy rain is expected this Thanksgiving holiday and debris flows will be a particular threat in the areas affected by the Camp, Carr, Delta, Hirz and Mendocino Complex fires, the NWS said.

The first rain to fall over the burn-scarred areas of the Woolsey fire is expected to start Wednesday night. Forecasters are predicting it will be a weak storm, not intense enough to trigger significant flows of mud and debris — although it could cause some minor rockslides and mudslides.

But experts say stronger storms in the coming months have the potential to send life-threatening mudflows plowing through neighborhoods. That threat has authorities urging residents living on or below hillsides, in canyons and along stream channels to take steps to prepare their homes, keep an eye on the weather, quickly heed warnings and evacuation orders, and be ready to leave well before the rain arrives.

“If you can see burned hillsides from your house, you are threatened by debris flow,” said National Weather Service meteorologist Eric Boldt, who works with emergency planners and other local officials to coordinate warnings. “You don’t want to be there when the rain starts. There’s just not enough time to wait and see what happens.”

Read more here.

NASA has released dramatic satellite images of the destructive wildfires in California.

The data show the progression of the fires and how they burned homes, as well as satellite images of what they look like from space.

See more here.

Rain is forecast this week in the burn zones of Paradise in Northern California and the Malibu/Ventura County area in Southern California.

This has prompted concern about mudflows.

Soil in a burned area can be repellent to water, creating a flood-like flow on the ground that picks up rock and debris.

In an area that has not burned, soil can become saturated. Pressure builds up underground, and soil starts moving and begins picking up mud and debris as it starts flowing downhill.

Here’s how hillsides that have been burned by wildfire become prone to flash floods and dangerous mudslides during heavy rains.

A broken skull and a few other bone fragments found in the scorched hills of Latigo Canyon on Saturday came from a human who died well before the Woolsey fire, Los Angeles County sheriff’s investigators said Wednesday.

A landowner spotted what appeared to be human bones Thursday as he was checking fire damage to his property off Latigo Canyon Road, about a mile north of Ocean View Road, near mile marker 6.92, Sgt. Marcelo Quintero said.

The property didn’t notify authorities about the bones until Saturday.

Quintero said the skull was likely hidden by heavy brush in the area before the Woolsey fire, which scorched much of the land and several structures in the canyon above Malibu.

Investigators believe the wildfire may have dislodged the remains from where they were stuck higher up the hilly terrain, and sent them tumbling down into the pathway where they were found, on property owned by the Ava and Cole Weintraub Family Park conservancy group.

“The skull was broken into pieces but we were able to piece it somewhat together,” Quintero said. “The anthropologists at the coroner’s office believe it definitely predated the fire.”

Coroner’s investigators believe the remains could been there between six months and 50 years, he said. They have some fire damage, he said, but no bite marks.

“We only have parts of a skull, parts of a jaw and possibly some cervical vertebra pieces,” Quintero said.

The Los Angeles County coroner’s Special Operations Response Team, or SORT, combed the area, hoping to find more remains. They did find additional bones, Quintero said, but they turned out to belong to animals.

“We’re going to do our best to try to identify whoever this person was,” he said. “But it’s going to be a long shot, at best.”

Anyone with information should contact the sheriff’s Homicide Bureau at (323) 890-5500. Those wishing to remain anonymous should call Crime Stoppers at (800) 222-8477.

Firefighters are hoping to have full containment of the Woolsey fire sometime today.

The fire, which killed three people, destroyed more than 1,600 structures and burned over 96,000 acres from Oak Park to Malibu, was 98% contained as of Tuesday night.

People continued to return to their homes, but officials warned of possible rain in the burn areas later this week.

A pair of incoming storms are threatening to hamper recovery efforts in Paradise, Calif.

In a worst-case scenario, the downpour could flood the ruins and wash away human remains, leaving authorities unable to find and identify every victim of California’s deadliest wildfire on record.

Authorities fear bones could sink underwater, making them harder to spot and drowning any scent that cadaver dogs rely on to find them.

Meteorologists say the Camp fire burn scar — which is larger than the city of San Jose — could see up to 6 inches of rain through Saturday, with the heaviest downpour expected overnight Thursday. The forecast has triggered a flash flood watch for possible rock slides and debris flows.

Light showers were falling Wednesday morning with heavier rain expected later in the day.

“That rain is going to get in that ash, it’s going to turn into it a paste-like substance,” said Monterey County sheriff’s Cmdr. Joe Moses, who is helping in the recovery effort. “It’s going to stick to everything and slow things down.”

Read more here.

Paradise narrowed its main road through town as well as two other streets in recent years, hoping to slow traffic and improve pedestrian safety.

The changes came despite warnings that a major fire would cause crippling gridlock during evacuations, a scenario that became grim reality when California’s worst wildfire swept into Paradise this month.

Read the full story here.

After a fast-moving fire swept into town a decade ago, burning more than 200 homes and trapping thousands of fleeing residents on gridlocked mountain roads, a grand jury called on officials to improve evacuation routes.

But six years later, the city decided to narrow a portion of the main road through town from four lanes to two as part of an effort in the downtown area aimed at boosting commerce as well as traffic and pedestrian safety.

Read More

The number of people unaccounted for in the destructive Camp fire rose to 870 on Tuesday after investigators were able to work through a backlog of voicemails, authorities said.

The surge comes as the death toll increased to 81, with two bodies recovered inside structures in the Butte County town of Paradise. Of the 81, authorities said they had tentatively identified 56 people.

By Tuesday evening, investigators had also been able to locate nearly 200 people reported missing, raising the number of people checked off the missing-persons list to 1,864.

The blaze has chewed through more than 152,000 acres and destroyed more than 12,600 homes. It was 75% contained.

A search-and-rescue team scans an area where there might be human remains.

(Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times)

The death toll from California’s worst fire rose to 81 on Tuesday as the search continued for the missing.

The fire has burned more than 12,000 structures, destroying most of the town of Paradise and other nearby communities.

As of Monday night, there were nearly 700 people still missing.

Rain is expected to hit the area tonight, complicating the search efforts.

Joe Moses, a commander with the Monterey County Sheriff’s Office who is assisting with search-and-rescue operations, said the rain is a concern for him and recovery crews.

“That rain is going to get in that ash [and] it’s going to turn it into a paste-like substance,” Moses said. “It’s going to stick to everything and slow things down.”

In a worst-case scenario, if torrential downpours were to hit Paradise, the foundations could flood and wash human remains away, increasing the possibility that workers may be unable to locate and identify victims. This concern appears to be greatest in rural areas such as Concow.

Authorities fear that bones may also lie underwater, making it harder for workers to spot them, and that the rain may wash away the scents that cadaver dogs seek out to find human remains.

Deborah Laughlin hasn’t heard from her son in nearly two weeks.

(Ruben Vives/Los Angeles Times)

Inside the cafeteria of Bidwell Junior High School, 63-year-old Deborah Laughlin sipped on coffee and scooped up some apple pie.

A lot was on her mind.

Laughlin said she lost her home in Paradise. She had been living at Evergreen Mobile Home Park. Since the evacuations, she has been at the middle school, where the Red Cross operates a shelter. She said she registered with FEMA and hopes she’ll be able to get housing.

“I don’t know what I’m going to do,” she said. “I told the manager of the Red Cross: ‘When you leave, I’m going with you.’”

Perhaps her greatest worry is her son, Shawn Evans, 40, whom she last heard from while he was evacuating from Magalia. She said he was driving on Imperial Way with his wife, who is eight months pregnant.

“I know where my husband is but I don’t know here my son is,” she said with teary eyes. “Please don’t tell me he died. Please.”

She said she is clinging to hope that her son is OK and that they’ll be reunited soon. She said she’s afraid about the storm that is approaching the region. She’s afraid because she knows there’s still people who are missing, people who may have died in the fire.

“I’m scared,” she said. “I’m scared they’ll be washed away and people’s remains will never be found.”

Sitting across was Anthony Salzarulo, 60, who had fought to save his home and five others in Concow. He said the fire was worse than any other blaze that had hit the region.

Salzarulo lost his home to a fire 10 years ago. Sipping water, he said his home suffered some damage in the Camp fire, mostly to his solar panels and generator. He lost a bus and a car.

When he was leaving the area, he saw animals that had died in the fire. A bobcat that had suffered burns walked near him. He’s had nightmares since.

He heard about the storm approaching. He worries a mudslide may take out his home, and it’s made him anxious. He wants to go home.

“I hope I have a home after this storm because it sounds like it’s a pretty bad one,” he said.

He said the storm had added to his nightmares.

“I was dreaming that there was a tornado and all these things were sticking to me,” he said. “They were human bones.”

Four members of the Oakland Fire Department’s Urban Search and Rescue Task Force removed a charred mattress spring and began combing through a mixture of ash, dirt, shredded wood and pieces of roofing tiles.

Using their gloves to move around the blackened dirt, they looked for human remains.

“This is hard,” one of the recovery workers said. “But we’re trying. Let everyone know we’re trying.”

By Wednesday afternoon, the recovery work will get harder. Forecasters said that’s when the rain will most likely start to come down over the Camp fire.

Joe Moses, a commander with the Monterey County Sheriff’s Office who is assisting with search-and-rescue operations, said the rain is a concern for him and recovery crews.

“That rain is going to get in that ash [and] it’s going to turn it into a paste-like substance,” Moses said. “It’s going to stick to everything and slow things down.”

In a worst-case scenario, if torrential downpours were to hit Paradise, a town devastated by the fire, the foundations could flood and wash human remains away, increasing the possibility that workers may be unable to locate and identify victims of the fire. This concern appears to be more evident in rural areas such as Concow.

Authorities fear bones could also lie underwater, making it harder to spot them and whatever scent cadaver dogs rely on to spot human remains could be drown out.

But Moses doesn’t believe the rain won’t be too bad and they plan to see their mission through.

The fire destroyed much of Paradise, burning more than 10,000 homes. Nearly 80 are confirmed dead, but nearly 700 remain missing in the worst fire in California history.

Only the top few feet of a utility pole survived the Woolsey fire as it roared over Kanan Road in Malibu.

( (Wally Skalij/Los Angeles Times))

Victims of the Woolsey fire have filed a lawsuit against Southern California Edison alleging the utility was negligent in failing to shut off power before the wildfire started, attorneys announced Tuesday.

The lawsuit, filed Friday in Los Angeles Superior Court on behalf of 17 plaintiffs, alleges the company ignored warnings of extreme fire weather and only shut power off once the fire started. That delay contributed to the Woolsey fire’s destruction, plaintiffs say.

The fire, which is currently 96% contained, killed three people and destroyed 1,500 structures, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. The cause of the fire remains under investigation.

Attorneys are seeking compensation for plaintiffs’ damaged property, lost wages and attorney fees.

The lawsuit claims that once the electricity was shut off on Nov. 12 — four days after the fire started — residents and firefighters lost water pressure, hampering efforts to battle the flames. That in turn heightened the safety risk for firefighters and homeowners who sheltered in place.

R. Rex Parris, one of the attorneys on the case, references the utility’s preliminary report filed Nov. 12 with the California Public Utility Commission stating an electric substation experienced a disturbance two minutes before the fire, which started in the same area.

“The report is preliminary,” said Edison spokesman Steve Conroy when the report was made public. “We have no other information other than a line went out of service and we don’t know why.”

In the report, the utility said a circuit in its Chatsworth substation near where the Woolsey fire started “relayed” two minutes before the fire broke out.

“This means an outage remains until it is safe to manually reenergize the circuit,” Conroy said. “This is not a Public Safety Power Shutoff; it is simply a safety feature to help mitigate wildfire risk.”

The lawsuit also blames Edison for potential damage to the environmental and public health caused by the burning of the Santa Susana Field Laboratory nuclear cleanup area, though some experts have said there was no damage.

The state Department of Toxic Substances Control, which oversees the long-delayed cleanup of the former rocket engine testing and nuclear research facility, said fire officials believed the blaze “did not present any risks other than those normally present in a wildfire situation.”

Edison said in an emailed statement that it cannot comment on lawsuits related to the Woolsey fire at this time and that it may take some time before an investigation into what caused the fire is completed.

“SCE’s focus at this time is service restoration to customers still impacted in the Malibu area, and providing additional assistance to customers through the L.A. County local assistance centers,” an Edison spokesman said.

The utility said it’s offering support for customers looking to turn service on and off, waiving charges associated with extended bill payments and charges associated with relocating and starting new service.

Parris said utility companies know of the dangers of high power lines running through fire zones, but that they do little to implement safeguards to prevent potential tragedies.

“When you have rules that are this important and you know people are violating them it’s inevitable that these catastrophic events happen,” Parris said of Edison and other utility companies. “Their view of safety is public relations.”

Victims of the Camp fire filed a lawsuit against Pacific Gas and Electric Co. also on Friday, alleging that utility is responsible for the fire that killed at least 79 people.

------

2:05 p.m.: This article was updated with statements from R. Rex Parris.

This article was originally published at 11:05 a.m.

Mandatory evacuations

• Malibu, from the Ventura County line east to Anacapa View Drive.
• Monte Nido West of Malibu Canyon Road.
• Liberty Canyon West to Decker Canyon and south to PCH

For all evacuation areas click here.

Road closures

1. Highway 101 offramps from Valley Circle Blvd to Liberty Canyon Road
2. Highway 1 southbound (Pacific Coast Highway) closed at Las Posas Road
3. Bell Canyon Road at Valley Circle Boulevard
4. Borchard at Los Vientos Drive
5. Lynn Road at Reino Road
6. Potrero Road between Rancho Dos Vientos and South Lewis Road
7. Kanan Road between Westlake Boulevard and Lindero Canyon Road
8. Falling Star Avenue at Kanan Road
9. Potrero Road at Wendy Drive
10. State Route 118 eastbound between Topanga Canyon and Yosemite Avenue
11. Mureau Road, Calabasas Boundary to 101 Freeway
12. Cornell Road, Mulholland Hwy to Kanan Road
13. Encinal Canyon Road, Malibu Boundary to Mulholland Hwy

Click here to see a full list of closures.

Evacuation centers

1. Camarillo Community Center – 1605 E. Burnley Street, Camarillo (accepting small animals)
2. Borchard Community Center – 190 Reino Road, Newbury Park (accepting small animals)
3. Goebel Senior Adult Center (obscured on map)– 1385 E. Janss Road, Thousand Oaks (at capacity)
4. Thousand Oaks Teen Center – 1375 E. Janss Road, Thousand Oaks
5. Thousand Oaks Community Center – 2525 North Moorpark Road, Thousand Oaks (closed)
6. Rancho Santa Susana Recreation Center – 5005 Unit C Los Angeles Ave., Simi Valley (no animals accepted)
7. Taft Charter High School – 5461 Winnetka Ave., Woodland Hills
8. Pierce College – 7100 El Rancho Drive, Woodland Hills (Entrance off Desoto Avenue); Los Angeles County Animal Services (accepting large animals)
9. Canoga Park High School – 6850 Topanga Canyon Blvd, Canoga Park
10. Palisades Charter High School (not displayed on map) – 15777 Bowdoin St, Pacific Palisades

School closures

1. Cal State Channel Islands
2. Cal Lutheran University (except for emergency personnel)
3. Moorpark Community College
4. Pepperdine University (Malibu and Calabasas campuses)
5. For Ventura County school closures, please check the Ventura County Office of Education website https://www.vcoe.org/

Animal shelters

1. Ventura County Fair Grounds – 10 W. Harbor Blvd., Ventura, (at capacity); Ventura County Animal Services (805) 388-4258
2. Ventura County Animal Shelter – 600 Aviation Drive, Camarillo (accepting small animals)
3. Simi Valley Animal Shelter – 670 W Los Angeles Ave., Simi Valley, (805) 388-4341 (accepting small animals)
4. Pierce College – 7100 El Rancho Drive, Woodland Hills (entrance off Desoto Avenue) (at capacity); Los Angeles County Animal Services
5. Hansen Dam Equestrian Center – 11127 Orcas Ave., Lake View Terrace (at capacity); Los Angeles County Animal Services
6. Earl Warren Show Grounds (not on map) – 3400 Calle Real, Santa Barbara (Check-in at Gate C off of Calle Real) (accepting large animals)
7. Shelter Hope — 193 N Moorpark Rd, Thousand Oaks, CA 91360 (lodging for evacuees and volunteers available)

If you need large animal assistance, please call (805) 388-4258

N95 Particulate filter mask availability

1. Goebel Senior Adult Center (obscured on map)– 1385 E. Janss Road, Thousand Oaks
2. Thousand Oaks Teen Center – 1375 E. Janss Road, Thousand Oaks
3. Rancho Santa Susana Recreation Center – 5005 Unit C Los Angeles Ave., Simi Valley
4. Borchard Community Center – 190 N Reino Road, Newbury Park
5. Camarillo Community Center – 1605 E Burnley St., Camarillo
6. North Oxnard Public Health – 2240 E. Gonzales Road, Oxnard
7. South Oxnard Public health – 2500 S. “C” Street, Oxnard
8. Channel Islands harbor master – 3900 Pelican Way, Oxnard
9. Las Posas Family Medical Group – 3801 Las Posas, Suite 214, Camarillo
10. Sierra Vista Family Medical Clinic – 2700 E Los Angeles Ave., Simi Valley
11. Moorpark Family Medical Clinic – 612 Spring Road, Building A, Moorpark

The valley behind it blanketed in a thick layer of smoke, a train sits stopped near Butte Valley along Highway 70.

(Kent Nishimura / Los Angeles Times)

Officials lifted evacuation orders for several communities near Lake Oroville on Tuesday.

The news comes as firefighters make progress in the battling the Camp fire, which as of Tuesday morning was 70% contained. The fire has consumed more than 151,000 acres and killed at least 79 people, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.

Officials announced that residents of all Berry Creek zones can return home, except the areas northbound Encina Grande Road at Choc Taw Ridge Road, northbound French Creek Road at Stephens Ridge Road and northbound Highway 162 at Four Mile Ridge Road.

Communities in the Cherokee Zone B zone can also return to the area, with the exception of areas northbound Red Tape Road at Condor Road, Rocky Top Road at Cherokee Road, Vinton Gulch at Cherokee Road, Crystal Pines Road at Cherokee Road and Highway 70 East of the West branch bridge.

All residents of the Messilla Valley Zone B can return home.

The rain forecast for Northern California is expected to improve air quality in the region, which has experienced unhealthful air due to the Camp fire.

Air quality improved somewhat Tuesday, but the smoke was supposed to dissipate more on Wednesday.

The Camp fire burn zone could see up to 6 inches of rain through Saturday, which isn’t unusual for that region, said Johnnie Powell, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Sacramento. In April, fire-ravaged Paradise, Calif., saw nearly 6 inches of rain in one day in what was its last significant storm.

The search-and-rescue team took a break as it waited for an excavator to moved debris from a pair of charcoal gray vehicles sitting next to a burned home in Butte Creek Canyon in Chico.

Nearby, a line of fire trucks and sheriff’s vehicles drove past the group, their occupants waving. The sun was starting to dip. Monday was coming to an end.

Since the Camp fire broke out on Nov. 8, authorities have been combing through crumbled homes and melted metal in an effort to locate and identify human remains.

The fire has killed at least 79 people, and about 700 others are unaccounted for, a significant drop from a few days ago when the list was more than 26 pages and had more than 1,200 names, but still a daunting number.

Now two storms are moving toward Northern California and are expected bring up to six inches of rain through Saturday, possibly hindering search operations.

“The pros and cons are that the weather will be in our favor to contain the fire,” said Cal Fire spokesman Manuel Garcia. “But the cons are that there will possibly be loose terrain, fallen trees, mudslides and downstream flows.”

The National Weather Service said the first of the storms will move into the region on Wednesday. The second storm will bring the heaviest rain on Thursday night through Friday morning.

Forecasters said the soil in the burn area cannot absorb rainwater, which could lead to fast-moving flows of mud, debris and even trees and boulders up to several feet deep that can be deadly.

Blocked roads caused by the storms as well as rivers of ash and debris could hinder search crews from conducting a massive search operation in a burn zone that is bigger in area than the city of San Jose.

Tom Madigan of the Alameda County Sheriff’s Department said that in some cases remains were so badly burned that they could not be recognized or just a few bones could be located.

“We’re finding remains in various states,” Butte County Sheriff Kory Honea said. “I suspect there are some that will have been completely consumed.”

“There is certainly the unfortunate possibility that even after we’ve searched an area, once people get back in there, it’s possible that human remains could be found. I know that’s a very difficult thing to think about, but that’s the difficult situation we find ourselves in today. “

Recovery workers in white jumpsuits and boots, firefighters, coroner employees and police chaplains from across the state have been working around the clock searching neighborhoods destroyed by the fire, but as the storms approach, the possibility of perhaps not finding everyone is starting to set in.

Ryan Spainhower hugs his wife after he recovers a coin that they made during their honeymoon from the debris of his home.

(Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times)

The deadly Camp fire grew slightly overnight — to 151,373 acres — as firefighters continued their efforts to get the blaze under control.

The fire, which has claimed at least 79 lives and destroyed more than 17,000 homes and commercial structures, is 70% contained, the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection said Tuesday.

At the same time firefighters work to control the blaze, residents in the burn area now face the potential for mudslides as a series of storms begin to make their way into the region.

The National Weather Service issued a flash flood watch through Friday morning where the fire raged through Butte County. While the rainfall will help with the firefight, neighborhoods that were destroyed, and those downstream of them, could see mudslides and debris flows, authorities said.

The burn zone could see up to 6 inches of rain through Saturday, which isn’t unusual for that region, said Johnnie Powell, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Sacramento. In April, Paradise saw nearly 6 inches of rain in one day in what was its last significant storm.

“Best-case scenario, it’ll rain on it and nothing will move. Worst-case scenario, the mud will start moving,” Powell said. “We just have to wait and see what happens. All we know for sure is, it’s going to rain really hard.”

One of the many striking, horrifying in images from Paradise is that trees still stand next to homes incinerated by fire.

Here is why.

Fires that spread from house to house generate a force of their own. Embers, broadcast by the wind, find dry leaves, igniting one structure then another, and the cycle is perpetuated block after block. Break that cycle and the fire quits, and destruction can be minimized.

Paradise never had that chance. Defensible space and hardened structures could not have kept the firestorm, carried on gusts clocking in the low 50s and feeding on the homes and low-lying vegetation, from reducing the town to ash.

Most telling were the trees. Most of the pines that sheltered this community still had their canopies intact. The needles, yellowed from the intense heat, were not burned — evidence that the winds that morning had pushed the fire along so fast it never had a chance to rise into the trees. But as a surface fire, it lit up the homes that lay in its path.

Read more here.

Netflix’s teen drama series “13 Reasons Why” was in the midst of shooting its third season in Vallejo when the massive Camp fire and other blazes broke out in Northern California. The sets, which include a sound stage on Mare Island, weren’t touched by the conflagrations, but the pervasive smoke that has shrouded much of the Bay Area has forced the show to temporarily halt shooting.

The Paramount-produced series is one of a number of TV and commercial shoots that have experienced disruptions because of the fires that have devastated California in recent weeks. Some prime shooting locations — including Paramount Ranch, which serves as a set for HBO’s “Westworld,” and the Peter Strauss Ranch in Agoura Hills — have experienced extensive damage, rendering them inaccessible to crews. Large swaths of Malibu that are popular filming sites are also closed to production.

Read more here.

The National Weather Service issued a flash flood watch through Friday morning where the Camp fire raged through Butte County, Calif. While the rainfall will help with the firefight — the blaze is 70% contained and has burned 151,272 acres — neighborhoods that were destroyed, and those downstream of them, could see mudslides and debris flows.

The Camp fire burn zone could see up to 6 inches of rain through Saturday, which isn’t unusual for that region, said Johnnie Powell, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Sacramento. In April, Paradise saw nearly 6 inches of rain in one day in what was its last significant storm.

“Best-case scenario, it’ll rain on it and nothing will move. Worst-case scenario, the mud will start moving,” Powell said. “We just have to wait and see what happens. All we know for sure is, it’s going to rain really hard.”

The soil in recently burned areas cannot absorb rainwater. Enough rain can lead to fast-moving flows of mud, debris and even trees and boulders that can be deadly for those in their path. The devastation often comes without warning.

The two pilots were dropping water on a flank of the destructive Woolsey fire the day after it broke out when they got a request to rescue people stuck nearby on Castro Peak in the hills above Malibu.

Their fuel supply was dwindling and thick smoke filled the air around them. Eventually they found a flat spot to ground the helicopter, and one of the pilots hopped out. Moments later, he emerged with three people and two dogs.

The dramatic mountain rescue, involving Los Angeles Fire Department pilots David Nordquist and Joel Smith, was captured in an 11-minute video the agency released Monday.

Once the people and pets were in the plane, the pilots took off.

“Ah, that was close,” one says after taking off

“Yeah, it was,” the other replied.

“That’s enough excitement for me today.”

The other laughed.

“You and me both, brother.”

Calvin Daley, 66, sat listening to jazz on his battery-powered radio on the front porch of his two-story home in the charred hills of Chico. Tiny birds hopped from the burned branches of a pine tree to a bird feeder.

Nearby, Pacific Gas and Electric crews repaired voltage lines, and other workers used an excavator to move aside hunks of melted metal that once were cars.

Daley didn’t evacuate. Instead, he hooked up three hoses, stationed them around his home and began dousing everything. Some people who stayed to fight for their homes died. He had at least three hours to work before the fire arrived with fury.

He had no goggles, no mask, just jeans, a T-shirt and hoses. Sometimes, the water evaporated before hitting its target.

His next-door neighbor’s home went up: “My heart sank; I couldn’t go over there and save it.”

Flames also claimed his wife’s ski boat and his 1987 Dodge Ram. Also incinerated was the nearby Honey Run covered bridge. By 10:30 p.m. the fire had moved on. Exhausted, Daley woke himself every hour or so to check on hotspots.

It was eerily quiet for three days, then the birds returned.

Next door, the neighbor’s cats had survived. He began feeding them.

As heavy rain approaches, he’s worried contaminants will run into his well. He also worries for people who have lost homes, for people living in tents. He wishes it were summer.

At the Butte County Fairgrounds in Gridley, the five Thompsons live at the end of a row of green cots.

Hot meals are served, snacks and water are readily available, as are toiletries and American Red Cross volunteers.

“We’re having to turn stuff away,” said Melissa Thompson, 38. “Someone handed me a $100 bill, and she lost her own home. It’s victims helping victims, and it’s amazing.”

But she’d like to find out if her apartment in Magalia survived.

“The unknown is the worst part,” said Thompson, who is legally blind and on disability.

As in other places, the fire caught them unawares and they ran for their lives, hopping onto two firetrucks. Daughter Savanna, 12, raced home from school to search for her family but could not get through. She ended up in Chico before being reunited with them.

Now she waits on her cot under fluorescent lights texting friends, watching YouTube videos, reading and listening to bands like Falling in Reverse. Her favorite donated shoes are a pair of black Vans high tops and some white Adidas sneakers.

“They’re expensive and I got them for free,” she said.

She’s not big on the 15-minute shower rule here: “It takes me 15 minutes just to get into the shower.”

(Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times)

For the last 10 years, the sound of police scanners has served as Thomas Gorden’s preferred soundtrack.

He doesn’t pay attention to every bit of information broadcast from the handful of devices he owns. But there are certain words and conversations he’s learned to key in on.

On Nov. 7, a call went out that someone had been shot outside the Borderline Bar and Grill in Thousand Oaks. Then another. Gorden listened to the drone of 911 calls picking up in the background. He realized there was nothing typical about this shooting.

“When [officers] went inside and said they’re going to need a lot of ambulances, that’s when I realized this was a mass shooting,” said Gorden, 22.

Gorden tweeted from @VCScanner — his Twitter account that has amassed a following of thousands — alerting many in the area to the shooting, including the first Los Angeles Times reporter on the scene.

Jess Weihe had just been about to close her laptop when she saw Gorden’s all-caps tweet about the shooting.

She stayed awake for several hours, anxiously refreshing her feed for more updates. Many in Thousand Oaks shared a similar story of a sleepless night after seeing the tweet that rattled their community.

“Early on, the not knowing is the scariest part,” said Weihe, who lives in Newbury Park.

Within 24 hours, another disaster hit Ventura County. First one fire, then a second.

Gorden heard the call for the Hill fire in Ventura County. As it grew, the Woolsey fire started in Ventura and Los Angeles counties. As it headed toward Oak Park, Gorden began tweeting. At one point, he worked for 48 hours straight without sleep. He didn’t slow down until this weekend.

“A lot of people are saying that they found my information more helpful than what officials were putting out or were able to evacuate earlier than other people who evacuated Oak Park after all the gridlock.”

Many said they relied on the account when they could smell smoke or see a fire but hadn’t yet received an emergency alert.

Cal Lutheran University senior Annabelle Worrall was in shock from the shooting, which took the life of Cal Lutheran alum Justin Meek, who graduated from the school in May.

She was sitting across from her roommate at a table when she got a Twitter notification from @VCScanner about a wildfire. They couldn’t believe it.

“Everyone was still freaked out from that day,” said Worrall, 21.

Worrall went to her house in Westlake Village and a few hours later, she had to evacuate again. She eventually ended up in Pasadena.

“We’re just exhausted. I’m exhausted,” she said.

Police scanners aren’t foolproof methods for learning about emergencies and authorities caution against reporting on what’s overheard. There are rules Gorden abides by when it comes to sharing information. Tactics that could compromise the safety of police officers, for example, are something he never touches.

“Certain things shouldn’t be tweeted.”

Gorden, who lives in Simi Valley, started the @VCScanner account in 2011. The first wildfire he actively covered was 2013’s Springs fire in Ventura County. But it was last year, during the Thomas fire in Ventura and Santa Barbara counties, that people started paying more attention.

“I learned a lot from that one. People need to leave before there’s an evacuation order. You can’t rely on authorities to always get you out on time.”

In the case of the fires in Ventura County, Gorden said he heard from people who saw his tweets about 30 to 45 minutes before the official evacuation orders.

Gorden’s @VCScanner account following grew from 6,000 to 26,000 after the Thomas fire and has doubled to 55,000 since this month’s back-to-back episodes.

PG&E crews work to reinstall utility poles in Concow, Calif.

(Kent Nishimura / Los Angeles Times)

Victims of the Camp fire filed a class action lawsuit against Pacific Gas & Electric Company alleging the utility is responsible for sparking the deadly blaze that killed at least 77 people and destroyed more than 11,000 homes.

The lawsuit, filed Friday in a Butte County superior court by two law firms — Garner & Associates and Franklin D. Azar & Associates— alleges PG&E has a history of disregarding safety regulations to maximize corporate profits.

Attorneys are asking that PG&E pay victims for their loss of property and other costs related to the fire.

The lawsuit alleges PG&E has failed in the past to trim trees near power lines or proactively shutoff power in hazardous fire conditions, and that the fire was preventable. It references a report the utility filed that notified the California Public Utilities Commission of problems with a power line minutes before the Camp fire started.

“PG&E observed by aerial patrol damage to a transmission tower on the Caribou-Palermo 115 kV Transmission line … in the area of the Camp fire,” the utility said in the report.

The lawsuit also references radio transmission recordings of firefighters discussing a damaged transmission line near where the Camp fire started.

A spokesman for the utility said the report was preliminary.

PG&E had notified 70,000 customers that the utility may shut power off due to dangerous fire conditions, but no proactive power shutoffs were initiated. The lawsuit claims the company was negligent in failing to de-energize power lines in fire-prone conditions.

One of the plaintiff’s attorneys urged people affected by the fire to report their claims against PG&E.

“We encourage people affected by the Camp Fire to not respond to robocallers, but to contact the Butte County Bar Association or your local attorney first,” said attorney Ivy Ngo.

A representative for PG&E said the company is aware of the lawsuits regarding the fire.

“The safety of our customers and the communities we serve is our highest priority,” said spokeswoman Lynsey Paulo in an emailed statement. “It’s important to remember that the cause of the Camp Fire has yet to be determined. Right now, our primary focus is on supporting first responders and positioning our employees to assess damage, restore service and rebuild infrastructure, and helping our communities.”

On Wednesday, the utility said if it were found responsible for the fire, its liability would exceed its insurance coverage.

Officials have not yet announced findings on its investigation of what caused the Camp fire.

-------

2:25 p.m.: This article was updated with a statement from PG&E and additional details about the lawsuit.

This article was originally published at 1:45 p.m.

Here is a timeline of rain moving into the Paradise burn zone:

Monday: Dry skies.

Tuesday: Mostly dry skies with rain moving into coastal hills in afternoon and evening.

Wednesday: Rain across Northern California.

Thursday: Second storm system, with heaviest rain Thursday night and Friday morning; chance of debris flows..

Friday: Heavy rain; chance of debris flows.

Source: National Weather Service

A McDonald’s. A gas station. Thousands of homes. Residents of the town of Paradise lost everything.

The California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection is conducting an inventory of the damage. So far the agency has found more than 15,000 buildings ruined by the Camp fire.

Throughout their investigation they’ve taken thousands of photos. Here are some of them.

As the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection inventories the damage caused by the Camp fire, investigators are taking thousands of photos.

They reveal a town destroyed.

Read More

Times columnist George Skelton says Gov. Jerry Brown told the truth about the fires that no one wants to hear:

“You know, we’ve had fires for long before the Europeans showed up here,” the four-term governor replied. “And our indigenous people had a different way of living with nature. For 10,000 years, there were never more than 300,000 [people living in California]. Now we have 40 million and we have a totally different situation.

“So it’s not one thing. It’s people. It’s how people live, it’s where they live, and it’s the changing climate…. And the truth is…we’re going to have more difficulties. Things are not going to get better. They’re going to get more challenging because of the continuing alteration in the climate — lack of moisture, early snowmelt and faster winds, the whole thing.”

Read Skelton’s column here.

William Erlbacher, left, and Robert DePalma are being held by Butte County authorities.

(Cal Fire / Butte County Fire Department)

Officials have arrested two men in connection with the burglary of a fire station in Butte County.

Robert DePalma and William Erlbacher, both from Concow, Calif., were arrested on suspicion of vehicle theft, looting during an emergency and possession of stolen property, the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection and the Butte County Fire Department said in a statement Monday.

Bail was set at $250,000 for each man, officials said.

The Cal Fire station was set up to help with the Camp fire, which so far has burned 151,000 acres and was listed as 66% contained as of Monday morning.

Last week, Butte County officials arrested six others on suspicion of looting areas that had been evacuated.

A utility worker watches as President Trump’s motorcade heads down Pacific Coast Highway in Malibu on Saturday.

( (Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times))

At Malibu Colony Cove, some residents who managed to get past the checkpoint Sunday where sheriff’s deputies were turning back cars groused about the restrictions on their comings and goings.

Angelina Radden’s mother had returned to her West Malibu home.

“She’s very persistent,” Radden said cryptically when asked how her mother had pulled that off.

They had spent days cleaning ash from the house. When Radden heard Friday that a nearby Ralphs was open, she jumped in the car to get groceries — only to learn that the deputies would not let her drive back in. She ended up making the trip on foot.

“You kind of feel like you’re under house arrest,” said Radden, who was hiking back Sunday morning south along Pacific Coast Highway, heading to an area past the Paradise Cove road closure to meet up with a friend who would ferry her back to her car.

“You can’t go anywhere or do anything.”

Lynn Jacob strode past him, toting bags loaded with ice and other supplies back to her car. “The aftermath of this disaster is a disaster in itself,” she said.

Jacob, a longtime West Malibu resident who had returned to her home Sunday, said one of her elderly neighbors had gone to the grocery store without realizing she would be unable to return to her husband, Jacob said.

“She had to cry and cry. She went back three different times before she finally got through,” Jacob said.

Residents have ruefully started calling it the YOYO fire, she said, for “you’re on your own.”

Jeremy Saylors, 11, puts on his face mask respirator as his family returns to their burned-down home in Paradise.

(Marcus Yam / Los Angeles Times)

Firefighters continued to make progress overnight against the deadly Camp fire, which has ravaged Northern California for more than a week, boosting containment to 66%, the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection said Monday.

The fire grew slightly overnight and has chewed through 151,000 acres in Butte County. The blaze, which is the state’s deadliest wildfire, has claimed at least 77 lives and destroyed 15,850 structures. More than 11,000 of those buildings were homes.

Fire officials expect the blaze to be fully contained on Nov. 30.

When Jeff and Nan Thompson and their son Alex, a ruddy-haired 5-year-old with boundless energy, returned to their hilltop home in Malibu on Sunday, they were astonished by what had burned and what had not.

Burned: bushes scorched black along their driveway, a metal grate only steps from their living room windows, and a nearby house that used to loom over them from the hills.

Not burned: their butterscotch-colored house, which seemed practically untouched save for a scattering of Spanish tiles that had tumbled from the roof.

They already knew it had survived, thanks to neighbors and television footage, but it still amazed Nan Thompson to see just how close the flames had come. She stepped carefully over the broken tiles to photograph bits of damage: a charred patch of the sprinkler system, a garage window that had shattered.

Perhaps the strangest thing was their massive metal storage container, bigger than a dumpster, that had somehow been spun around and flung across the blackened land behind the house. The Thompsons feared it might tumble down the ravine, warning Alex not to get too close.

“Where’s the beehive that was under the container?” Alex asked as he zipped back and forth, a toy dog in his hand.

“It’s gone. All burned up,” Jeff Thompson replied.

Alex paused to take it in. “The bees’ home is burned,” he said.

Michelle Rader, who lives in hard-hit Magalia, Calif., said that as far as she knows, her home is still standing. But she attended a vigil because a house is not the only thing destroyed in a fire.

“Many of my friends and co-workers and colleagues have lost their homes,” she said. “I lost my workplace, which is something dear to my heart.”

Rader is the office manager and a board member of the Gold Nugget Museum, which burned in the Camp fire conflagration. One of the museum’s docents died in the Nov. 8 disaster.

John Sedwick, she said, “was an amazing storyteller and historian. It is quite a loss. ... He grew up in Old Magalia and had many amazing stories to tell.”

According to its website, the Paradise museum was founded in 1973. “Its mission is to preserve and protect the Ridge heritage through the collection and display of local artifacts, and with community education programs.”