Los Angeles County banned the official July 4 fireworks due to the coronavirus outbreak, but that did not appear to deter people from celebrating at home.
Los Angeles firefighters responded to thousands of emergency calls on Saturday and extinguished at least one major fire that consumed half of an apartment complex in Northridge, authorities said.
“As it always is, July 4th was a busier night for all the different types of fires,” said Margaret Stewart, spokeswoman for the Los Angeles Fire Department.
The LAFD, which serves the city of Los Angeles, has an average of less than 1,400 service calls during a typical 24-hour period. On Saturday, he answered 1,738 service calls, Stewart said.
They included 200 calls reporting trash fires, 103 reports of tree fires, 40 reports of structure fires, 28 of lawn fires and 11 of forest fires, he said.
The Los Angeles County Fire Department, which serves unincorporated Los Angeles County and 59 cities, also saw higher-than-normal call volume. The department answered more than 1,600 service calls on Saturday, compared to an average of 1,100 to 1,200 calls, Sky Cornell, a public information officer. Almost 500 of those calls were received in the one-hour period between 9 and 10 p.m., he said.
County firefighters were working Sunday morning to determine how many of the calls were related to fireworks.
In the city of Los Angeles, the most serious incident occurred when fireworks ignited several large palm trees in Northridge and the flames spread to a neighboring apartment complex, destroying several units and displacing about 50 residents, Stewart said.
“While people like to ignore and create their reasons why they think fireworks are illegal, last night he proved the point in terms of a tree fire that spread to an apartment building,” Stewart said.
The fire was reported in the 8600 block of North Wilbur Avenue, shortly before 9:30 pm. It took 81 firefighters 43 minutes to turn off the palm trees and eight apartment units that were completely enveloped, authorities said. Several residents were rescued and three people were hospitalized for smoke inhalation, the fire department said.
The coals of the burning palm trees also spread to the roof of a second eight-unit apartment building in the complex, starting a surface fire, but firefighters were able to put it out before it caused major damage, the department said.
An investigation by LAFD’s arson and anti-terrorism unit determined that the fire was started by illegal fireworks, authorities said.
Earlier in the week, Los Angeles County public health officials announced that the county was temporarily banning fireworks and closing beaches to avoid overcrowding over the holiday weekend in a bid to stem an alarming increase in cases. of coronavirus.
The city of Lancaster decided to defy the ban by hosting a public fireworks display at the Lancaster National Soccer Center. Parking lots were closed and residents were encouraged to watch from their homes or isolated outdoor areas.
The city’s mayor framed the move as a political statement in comments on social media.
“The ultra left is trying to steal on July 4,” wrote Mayor R. Rex Parris on Facebook. “In our city, we celebrate being Americans. Come visit me in prison, because no one is going to stop on July 4 in our city. “
The exhibition, which was broadcast live on the city’s Facebook page, was uneventful.
Despite the relative shortage of official fireworks displays, the displays in the backyard left the region in poor air quality. Fireworks emit high levels of particulate matter and metallic air pollutants, and July 4-5 are usually among the worst days in the region when it comes to high levels of fine particles in the air, health officials said.
Air quality in most of Los Angeles County ranged from unhealthy to very unhealthy as of Sunday morning, according to the South Coast Air Quality Management District. When air quality was considered unhealthy, which included downtown Los Angeles, parts of the coast, and parts of the San Fernando and San Gabriel valleys, residents were advised to avoid prolonged effort. People with heart or lung disease, older adults, and children were advised to avoid all physical activity outdoors in those areas.
Meanwhile, drier conditions, higher temperatures, and strong winds in parts of Los Angeles County raised concerns about the possibility of the fires spreading rapidly.
On Sunday, the minimum humidity dropped to single digits and to teens in many areas of the interior and foothills, while high temperatures in those areas are forecast to reach 10 degrees above normal, the Weather Service said. National.
Gusty winds were expected to hit the Lake Castaic area, the mountains of Ventura County and the south coast of Santa Barbara County on Sunday night. “Evening” winds are north winds driven by pressure differences that tend to strengthen in the afternoon and overnight hours, said Lisa Phillips, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Oxnard.
Taken together, weather conditions create an elevated fire risk that is not unusual for this time of year, he said.
“In this time period, we are dealing with many conditions that begin to reach high fire weather conditions, only periodically,” Phillips said. “We are in our fire season now.”
Temperatures were expected to gradually cool starting Monday, and coastal areas posted highs in the mid-1970s and valleys in the upper 80s on Thursday, before another forecast of warming for Friday. But the increased fire risk was expected to persist, Phillips said.
“Really, everyone should consider most days as high, only in terms of precautions we should take with the change of season,” he said.
