Residents outside town watch from afar as homes burn during Los Angeles fires
Diego Wallraff was on a retreat in India when his apartment building in Pacific Palisades burned down last week. A somatic therapist and actor, he lost most of his most prized possessions, including the irreplaceable Tibetan singing bowls and gongs he collected during 15 years of world travel.
Wallraff, 63, initially thought his home had been spared. The fire tracking app Watch Duty showed the fire had not spread to his area of Palisades. But that turned out to be false hope – the app's map was hours behind what was happening on the ground in real time.
“Then, all of a sudden, it updated and showed red fire zones had spread throughout the area,” he said. He felt an “emotional feeling” in his body: “Wait, did I just lose everything I own?”
Soon, images of his buildings “destroyed in rubble” were confirmed.
Wolraff was part of a grieving fraternity of Los Angeles County residents who watched in horror from a distance as the lives they knew were reduced to ashes in the ferocious Palisade and Eaton fires.
In interviews with several residents as far away as Europe, Asia and New York whose homes were destroyed, they shared a similar set of feelings: a sense of helplessness in the face of nature's wrath. They waited in panic to see if their homes were still intact. Feeling guilty for not being there when the tragedy occurred, but also feeling that things could have been worse.
By Saturday, Wallraff had learned some positive lessons from the week's experiences, which led him to reflect on the love of family and friends.
“There are no guarantees in our life. It could be over tomorrow, it could be over in 10 minutes,” he said. “It highlights how interconnected we all are. No matter what community you are in, fire does not discriminate.”
Helena Stuart and her husband learned Tuesday from their second home in New York that a massive fire was sweeping through the Palisades, where they built their dream home in 1994 Property purchased.
At first, she wondered if they should catch a flight back to Los Angeles, but soon she received a video from a neighbor showing their sunny stucco house on a narrow alley reduced to ruins that could be seen to vast views of the Pacific Ocean.
“I started crying. My husband said, ‘Well, we’re lucky we weren’t there, aren’t you glad we weren’t there? ” she said. “I said no, because initially you want to do something there. But there's really nothing you can do, nothing you can do.”
Stewart, 73, said Friday she still feels “devastated, numb, sad, all these devastating feelings.”
But she's also grateful.
Only Hearts, the Santa Monica boutique she opened in 1989, is still standing, although she has been nervous about its fate since the Palisades Fire evacuation zone was expanded last week to include a large swath of the coastal city.
“I can't even watch this on TV,” she said.
Richard Kipling and his wife, Alison Sowden, were at their second home in Santa Fe, New Mexico, when they learned that their Altadena house had been occupied. The Eaton fire destroyed.
Kipling, a retired Los Angeles Times editor and journalism professor, said he doesn't think they could have done much if they were in California.
“There was such chaos going on,” he said. “When you go out of town, at least you're out of the vortex and you don't have to breathe horrible air or drink horrible water.”
The couple learned from evacuated neighbors that their house was one of more than two dozen on their block destroyed by the fire. They had planned to return Thursday, but their insurance adjuster told them there was no reason to do so — they wouldn't be allowed into their neighborhood and the rubble left behind by the fire was highly toxic.
So Kipling, 80, was filled with gratitude and sadness.
“We're lucky that we didn't get burned in the fire. We're lucky that we have a second home in Santa Fe,” he said. “But in terms of the sense of loss, it's horrific… It's devastating to the community that we love.”
He also described a sense of survivor's guilt, those who are lucky enough to have avoided painful experiences while others suffered.
“Our friends are out there, going through the pain and anguish of knowing their homeland doesn't exist, and here we are in this beautiful place,” he said. “We sympathize with them. But we are also sad knowing that our home has been destroyed.”
Now, between the toxic consequences of the fire and the challenges of dealing with insurance companies and housing red tape, Kipling and Soden are unsure whether another home will be built to replace the one they lost.
“I'm 80 years old,” Kipling said. “I said to my wife, 'You know, if we decide to rebuild, I may not see the end of it.'”