The long-awaited report investigating how Los Angeles County officers did not order well timed evacuations for west Altadena because the Eaton hearth threatened the group didn’t assign blame for the botched alerts, as an alternative chalking up the problem to an evening of chaos, unprecedented circumstances and poor communication.
The 132-page report launched Thursday appeared to downplay how early the fireplace threatened west Altadena — regardless of 911 calls that reported flames and smoke within the space — and solely as soon as talked about the 19 individuals who died within the hearth, of which all however one had been discovered within the city’s western aspect.
As an alternative, it centered on the fireplace’s “good storm,” poor preparation and the truth that the satellite-outlined “hearth entrance” hadn’t entered west Altadena till 5 a.m. after evacuation alerts had been issued, although a number of spot fires had been confirmed within the space earlier within the night time.
The impartial investigation by consulting agency McChrystal Group, launched eight months after the Los Angeles space firestorm, got here after The Instances revealed that the county didn’t subject evacuation alerts in west Altadena till hours after smoke and flames from the Eaton hearth threatened the group.
Whereas areas east of Lake Avenue obtained evacuation orders simply after 7 p.m. on Jan. 7, most of west Altadena didn’t obtain any evacuation alerts till 3:30 a.m. Some zones didn’t obtain alerts till nearly 6 a.m., hours after folks started reporting hearth within the space to 911.
Officers advised the Instances that the duty to subject evacuation orders was cut up amongst three companies: the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Division, the Los Angeles County Fireplace Division and the county Workplace of Emergency Administration.
However Los Angeles County Sheriff Robert Luna later downplayed his division’s position, saying firefighters sometimes take the lead as a result of they’re “the specialists” in such conditions. The Workplace of Emergency Administration, which is in control of sending out alerts, mentioned there have been no technical points.
With out assigning blame or explaining what went incorrect, the report confirmed that between 1 and three a.m. on Jan. 8, the county didn’t ship out any evacuation alerts — together with to west Altadena. The report mentioned that at the moment, “all areas [L.A. county fire officials] believed had been instantly impacted by or in danger from the Eaton Fireplace had already obtained an evacuation warning or order.”
However that was clearly not the case.
The primary evacuation order for west Altadena got here at 3:25 a.m., after dispatchers obtained not less than 14 studies of fireplace within the space, in response to 911 logs from the Los Angeles County Fireplace Division obtained by The Instances.
The report mentioned that the preliminary requires hearth didn’t match the placement of destroyed buildings, showing to query the validity of these early calls and the presence of flames. The report claimed that the primary 911 name for a hearth in west Altadena the place the construction was later confirmed broken got here simply earlier than 1 a.m. on Jan. 8 — nonetheless greater than two hours earlier than evacuation orders had been issued.
The studies supplies two examples of Fireplace Division employees flagging that the fireplace could also be burning west greater than an hour earlier than evacuations alerts went out for west Altadena.
A Fireplace Division employees member within the subject in Altadena mentioned they advised to Unified Command employees somewhat earlier than midnight on Jan. 8 that, because of excessive winds, evacuation orders ought to exit for the foothills of Altadena, all the way in which to La Cañada. Unified Command employees mentioned they didn’t recall this occurring and that the fireplace entrance was not shifting west on the time.
About two hours later, at 2:18 a.m., a staffer with the county Fireplace Division radioed in that they noticed hearth north of Farnsworth Park shifting west alongside the foothills.
Although some officers current within the decision-making course of advised investigators they’d taken notes within the subject about evacuation choices, the notes “had been both incomplete, not time-stamped, or not maintained.”
“No official kind or documentation was utilized by LACoFD, LASD or OEM to collectively and formally file which zones ought to obtain evacuation orders or warnings, the time the choice was made, or the time the zones had been communicated to OEM employees on the EOC.”
The report additionally talked about — with out naming particular folks or companies — that the county “had issues about over-warning” throughout the hearth, worrying about including confusion, panic or pointless site visitors points. State tips on alert and warning techniques explicitly warn in opposition to this, as have specialists, repeatedly.
The report mentioned that based mostly on satellite tv for pc information from the Nationwide Guard, the fireplace entrance didn’t cross into western Altadena till round 5 a.m., two hours after evacuation orders had been issued. The report acknowledged that 911 calls had been coming in from the realm hours earlier than the orders, however categorized these incidents as “spot fires.”
The report repeatedly mentions how circumstances created a “good storm” for firefighters, whereas highlighting that there gave the impression to be an actual focus about NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab catching hearth, which may launch poisonous fumes if ignited.
Whereas the fireplace initially burned eastward, firefighters quickly reported that it was spreading “in all places abruptly” with wind gusts between 70-90 MPH.
“Evacuation choices and messages couldn’t hold tempo with the fireplace,” the report acknowledged.
The report additionally claims that the fireplace entered west Altadena as wind speeds elevated, describing it as a “extra densely populated” space with older properties constructed with supplies that had been “extra weak to ignition.”
The report discovered a number of issues with how the county carries out evacuations. Generally, when officers evacuated a zone, they might robotically evacuate the zone subsequent to it. However that follow was not codified and didn’t occur in western Altadena.
The three companies in cost additionally didn’t have a single platform with which to coordinate communication, exacerbating points with decision-making throughout the fireplace response, the report discovered. Sheriff’s division employees might not have been conscious in actual time of which zones had been below evacuation warnings or orders, as they weren’t all the time aspect by aspect with different companies at unified command, in response to the report.
The report was carried out by The McChrystal Group, a consulting agency with expertise assessing authorities response to pure disasters. The report included dozens of interviews with hearth and county officers in addition to public listening periods.
Some who attended the periods mentioned they had been cathartic. Others mentioned they had been skeptical a lot would come of the county-funded report.
“I feel it’s going to be extra scorching air to cowl the county’s ass,” mentioned Shawna Dawson Beer. whose house burned down within the Eaton Fireplace. “I don’t anticipate any actual accountability.”
Throughout a Could 7 listening session, residents repeatedly advised the consultants that their evacuation orders had been dangerously delayed. “None of us actually obtained alerts,” mentioned one girl.
County officers largely declined to reply questions on what went incorrect with the delayed evacuation alerts, citing the continued probe. The McChrystal Group additionally didn’t reply questions, solely issuing two updates over the previous couple of months, although neither contained any substantive data.
In 2019, nearly a yr after the Woolsey hearth, the same report ready by Citygate Associates detailed how a number of simultaneous fires strained first responders’ means to prioritize the place to ship folks. The blaze destroyed some 1,600 buildings and killed three folks.
Related points had been discovered with the county’s response this January, in response to the 2025 report. Each studies questioned the knowledge of additional improvement in fire-prone areas, given officers’ acknowledged lack of ability to defend the huge variety of Californians who dwell inside excessive danger areas.
A Instances investigation additionally discovered that almost all county hearth vehicles didn’t shift into west Altadena till lengthy after it was ravaged by hearth. Many county hearth vehicles had already been deployed to the Palisades hearth and to east Altadena. Marrone mentioned the dearth of fireplace vehicles in west Altadena in all probability boiled right down to “human error” by hearth officers who determined the place the vehicles ought to transfer.
