After California fires, LA resident asks, ‘Is it time to leave?’

“Is it time to go?”

That’s the question my husband and I have been asking ourselves with traumatic regularity over the past seven days. When we saw the Eaton fire break out in nearby Altadena, we wondered. When we got the evacuation warning, we responded: We packed the car, took a few extra minutes to scoop out some photo albums, and left.

After the warning and nearby mandatory evacuations were lifted in our area on Saturday, we returned home. Our power went out on Sunday, and when neighbors received texts saying it would be out until Wednesday, we asked the question again – we hadn’t bothered to unpack the cars. Then the lights came on and we figured we’d stay. On Monday, we woke up again to strong winds and a “special hazardous situation” alert from the National Weather Service.

Compared to the thousands of people who live in the Los Angeles area, we are incredibly lucky. And we feel that. But we are also exhausted and, with the wind blowing hard, even as I write, on edge. Now the question has become bigger and more demanding.

Is it time to go…forever? To leave if not the California foothills we’ve called home for 21 years?

A year or two after I moved to LA, the 1993 Old Topanga fire swept through Malibu, creating scenes of desperate flight and destruction similar, if more limited, than those we’ve seen from Altadena and the Palisades. I remember people joking at the time that “Malibu” was a Native American term for “Don’t live here.”

Altadena also burned that year, once in a brush fire there killed two firefightersagain in a wildfire that destroyed or damaged 40 homes. But it was after Old Topanga that the revered California author, activist and historian Mike Davis wrote his famous essay, “The Case for Letting Malibu Burn,” in which he argued, among other things, that Los Angeles had already paid too high a price for allowing wealthy people seeking seclusion, beauty and exclusivity to build on sites historically prone to fire.

Now I look at the mountains that rise around my community of La Crescenta, beautiful hills that, depending on the season and amount of rainfall, can make you feel like you’re in Ireland or Scotland. And I wonder: Should we live here?

Just two years ago they were covered in snow; a few weeks ago the fog crept in as it often does. On Sunday, with the Eaton fires still raging, they sat serene and seemingly untouched against a clear blue sky, the air so clear you’d never know a horrific fire continued to burn just miles away.

But I know it’s a mirage. The wind can change that in an hour; an arson or accidental spark in less than a minute. During the station fire in 2009, flames were visible on the hills when we evacuated. At more than 160,000 acres, it remains the largest wildfire in Los Angeles County history, claiming the lives of two firefighters and destroying 89 homes.

The fires of January 2025 will be remembered for far more extensive destruction of property. With at least 24 people dead and more than 12,000 structures destroyed, the Eaton and Palisades fires are among the worst in modern history — and they’re still burning.

Angelenos pride themselves on their resilience. For many, fires (like floods or earthquakes) are the price you pay to live in paradise.

But with climate change forcing Southern California into a frenzied cycle of flood and drought, people are beginning to question the wisdom of building or rebuilding communities that border the wilder areas of LA’s varied topography. Davis’s essay is once again quoted, live and in subtitles, as officials, experts, historians and randoms on Reddit debate the sustainability of Southern Californians living so close to hills and mountains where fires regularly erupt.

Davis was not talking about Altadena or the foothills, where fire has been far more rare than in Topanga and Malibu. But still, if I step out of my house, I can see hills covered with dried brush and the tops of power plants. And I wonder.

Not that we live in an urban wilderness. We live in what is known as a developed tract, dominated by the wide streets and cheek-by-jowl mid-century homes designed by Webster Wiley. There are street lights and sidewalks; a park and a dozen schools are within walking distance.

Nor did we come seeking privacy, exclusivity, or even beauty, at least of the wild kind. We bought here because of the nice school district, the easy commute to The Times, which was downtown at the time, and the overall price. Down the hill in Montrose, Honolulu Boulevard is such a lively and classic small-town main street that it appears in countless TV shows and movies.

Yes, as we drive up the streets leading to our home, we dip under mountains of California oak trees, see deer, bobcats, and the occasional bear, but as in Altadena, there is nothing exclusive about this part of the world, and we still felt as part of the world. of the metropolis; on a clear day you can see most of downtown.

My husband and I love our home, where we have spent most of our marriage and raised our three children. As we watch as people, including friends and colleagues, post pictures of the smoldering ruins of equally loved homes, our hearts break. But they are also filled with fear. It could so easily be us. Next time, or even this time.

A house is just a house compared to human life. But our house is the only thing of real value that we own. (Mostly; there’s still a mortgage.) It’s what allowed my husband to (finally) retire at 72, and barring unexpected wind turbines, it’s the only legacy our kids will have. We have fire insurance, but given the recent history of this industry, our premiums may be raised to unsustainable levels or our coverage dropped altogether. And so what?

If we’re lucky and the house continues to survive this interminable fire season, we can console ourselves with the uniqueness of these dire circumstances—the 85-plus-mph “mountain wave” winds, the heavy early spring rains followed by unusual dryness. After all, this isn’t Malibu. How often could such a terrible confluence of events occur?

Too often in recent years and no doubt more often in the future. Climate change is real and it is flooding, burning, battering and drying California, the country and the world on a daily basis. And not just in disaster-prone places.

Scientists warn, too many politicians ignore, and the rest of us are forced to evacuate, to mourn friends and family, to gape at the wreckage of where we once lived.

I have railed and will continue to rail at those who refuse to quickly and resolutely address the environmental problems that threaten all life on this planet. But right now, as I check in with The Times’ excellent fire coverage and regularly use Watch Duty to see if the Eaton fire is on the move again, my husband and I look up at the hills and ask each other, “Is it time to go?”

Are the mountains that have delighted and inspired us for so many years now a threat? Will the eucalyptus in the corner of our yard be our downfall? Or the pine trees that tower around our neighborhood?

We’ve already gotten rid of our lawn, put in gravel and succulents, taken down two trees that had grown uncomfortably close to our house. But we still have roses and lavender, jasmine and ivy. We felt we had to plant two smaller trees to replace the ones we killed. Now they have grown and their dry leaves rustle in the wind. Was it a mistake? Is it even a miscalculation to be here?

We’re exhausted, we’re anxious, and the Santa Anas are blowing, which can shred sane thoughts even without extreme fire risk. With so many in real crisis, it is hardly time for the existential variety. There are thousands in critical need; to consider what could happen is a luxury when so many have to make do with what they already have.

Nevertheless, the city, county and state will face tough questions and make tough choices once the fires are out. How do we prevent such a disaster from happening again? Can we?

Homes, businesses and lives must be rebuilt, but how and where?

Our car remains packed as we squint towards the hills. For now, we can only pray and await further instruction.