Hundreds of firefighters rushed to Los Angeles the day the Palisades wildfire began; on Tuesday, Jan. 7, 2025, the California Office of Emergency Services issued a request for strike teams across the state. A 22-person team from the Bay Area left to aid one of the most destructive wildfires California has seen, spreading over 23,000 acres with over 12,300 structures threatened.
“We drove down to LA on Tuesday night. We left Livermore around midnight, got down there Wednesday morning, and immediately went to work,” said Justin Ironside, an apparatus operator for the Berkeley Fire Department and acting officer for the incident in LA. “We were out there for a total of 14 days,” he said.
The team’s first two days in LA consisted of 24-hour work periods, extinguishing flames, and doing structure protection to prevent unaffected buildings from catching on fire. They eventually got 24 hours off on the 10th where the whole strike team stayed in a hotel due to an overflow at their base camp.
At the height of the fire, “I want to say there was a neighborhood of 10,000 or more firefighters,” Ironside said. Incident response teams worked on everything from producing the nearly 50-page daily action plan everyone received, to extinguishing fires, and coordinating impromptu helicopter landing sites with homeowners.
“I have a lot of family friends in LA, so it’s been stressful, like just checking in on them and making sure they’re okay and their house is okay,” Hannah Slattery-Weisberg, a Berkeley High School sophomore said. Slattery-Weisberg’s dad was working in LA when the fires started. “He was updating us about how the smoke was really bad, and it was hard to go outside,” she said.During this time, many LA residents whose homes were in imminent danger left for hotels. Slattery-Weisberg’s family friends ended up evacuating to the same hotel her dad was staying at.
Others decided to leave LA altogether. “My sister first went down to San Diego with her friends, but then they thought it was best to come back to our house until it got a lot safer in the area,” said Emma Candler, a BHS sophomore.
Candler’s sister is a BHS alumna and University of California Los Angeles freshman. Several of her teachers’ houses were destroyed or damaged, and UCLA temporarily switched to remote teaching on Tuesday, Jan. 9, 2024, for almost two weeks, until Wednesday, Jan. 21, 2024 when they officially resumed in-person instruction as regularly scheduled. As a result of the Palisades, Eaton, and Hughes fires, LA County issued evacuation orders and warnings to over 30,000 people.
“I know a girl around my age who was home alone when the fires were coming close to her house. She had just gotten her (driver’s) permit, and she had to take the car and drive away from the fires. Her house burned down,” Candler said.
Ironside explained that mass evacuations not only impact residents, they often create challenges for first responders. The urgency of escaping a fire can lead to traffic on the roads when firefighters are trying to reach the scene.
“Sunset Boulevard was completely blocked by cars trying to escape,” Ironside said. He explained how the fire trucks they operate take up a lot of space, and during the last large fire event in Berkeley, “it was a significant issue getting up into some of the larger roads that were blocked by cars,” Ironside said.
To help lessen this common traffic issue, Ironside suggested that everyone stay conscious and aware of the weather, especially conditions such as high temperatures, dry spells, and windy events. Winds are a significant factor in the starting and spreading of wildfires. Ironside also recommended looking into notification apps and alert systems.
“The red flag (one of the highest alerts in fire danger) has started now, making it more area-specific, as opposed to just the general red flag,” Ironside said. As technology improves, warnings have become more localized. Staying aware of even basic weather conditions can give you the needed time to get away before a wildfire starts. “Be ready to go sooner than later,” advised Ironside, “have the ability to grab your important documents in a timely fashion.”
Berkeley and some parts of LA have similar topography. Candler and Slattery-Weisberg both felt the fires in LA increased their awareness on how easily this could happen to them.
“Now that it’s like my sister and people I know that are being affected, it’s like I’m thinking more about how it can happen,” Candler said.
Despite these worries, the overwhelming support LA received — from first responders, out-of-state firefighters, incarcerated volunteers, donors, and others — has shown the strength of a community in times of crisis.
“I feel like I’ve seen a lot of people working really hard — a lot of firefighters,” Candler said. Almost three weeks after the fires started, there were still over 8,000 firefighters deployed in the area, and as of Friday, Jan. 31, 2025, the Palisades fire was officially declared 100 percent contained.