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Sunday, January 26, 2025

California fires impact Kiwi Angelenos

A photo of the California fires taken by a neighbour of the Los Angeles-based Devereux family, of Howick. Photo supplied

Kiwis based in Los Angeles with east Auckland connections have communicated the horrors they’ve witnessed of the destructive fires in California over the past week.

Musicians – Justin Devereux, Ted Brown, and Greg Johnson – have corresponded with the Times this week and their accounts are hard reading, as has been the viewing of all the images of the catastrophe.

Undoubtedly, people in this area and country are feeling for Los Angeles, a sister city of Auckland.

Ted Brown, a guitar player who has worked a lot with Los Angeles-based New Zealand singer-songwriter Greg Johnson, lived in Pakuranga when growing up and studied at Edgewater College. It’s where he learned to play guitar.

On Sunday, Brown posted: “Thanks to everyone who has messaged us to make sure we’re safe.

“Our house is covered in ash and the fire (just for now) is still a couple of miles away.

“Some friends have not been so lucky – heart-breaking.”

Brown then told the Times: “I’m in line at the pharmacy with three people who lost their homes in the Palisades.

“We’re still concerned we’re going to be in the evacuation zone.

“This has been a scary time. I’ve lived in West LA for 23 years and never seen fires like this,” Brown says.

“We’re used to fire season, usually fuelled by the bone-dry Santa Ana Winds we get October to January.

“But these were different, super strong gusts that could knock you off your feet.

A view of the Palisades fire from Koreatown, Los Angeles. Photo supplied Unsplash.com Jessica Christian

“The fires just exploded through the Pacific Palisades, about four miles from here.

“My favourite hiking trail, Temescal Canyon Park, is gone. Restaurants I visit regularly in Malibu with my family.

“But we’ve been lucky, still about a mile outside the evacuation zone, although we’re packed and ready to leave our home if we’re told to,” Brown says.

“LA is really a lot of different cities, spread out over a large geographic area, so the Eaton fire and the Palisades fire are a long way apart.

“But Angelenos have been amazing, and the sense of giving and community is incredible.

“Donation centres have popped up and been inundated, food trucks are 100 per cent free – people are coming together to help their neighbours and strangers alike.

“But 5200 structures destroyed in the Palisades alone, thousands more in Alta Dena. Not sure how we come back from this, probably the worst fires in California history and they’re still burning.

“I guess we’ll just all be dealing with it a day at a time,” says Brown.

Johnson, the award-winning Kiwi musician who has been based in Los Angeles for the best part of this century, played a concert at Uxbridge Arts and Culture in Howick just under a year ago.

He posted on social media of the fires in and around Los Angeles: “Truly apocalyptic couple of days here.

“Multiple good friends have lost everything, but thankfully we are all alive and safe.

“Our apartment is right by the ‘t’ in Santa Monica on the map. Thanks for all the dear friends that have checked in. Love to you all. LA is many things but dull it is never.”

The Eaton blaze photographed from Koreatown, LA. Photo supplied Unsplash.com Jessica Christian

Singer-songwriter Justin Devereux, of Howick, who moved with wife Maria and son Oliver to Los Angeles two years ago, told the Times they’ve been “humbled by the amount of people checking in on us”.

“Luckily, we’re back in New Zealand visiting our parents for Christmas and the holidays. But it’s been an anxious and upsetting time,” says Devereux.

“It’s hard to believe really, and it’s been quite emotional watching it unfold here.

“I just can’t believe the scale of it all and how much iconic history has been lost. And there’s nothing we can do but check in on friends and our cat Sophie, who’s at an animal hotel nearby.

“Maria and I were at the Fourth of July parade at the Palisades last year. And now the high school and the whole town is gone. It was such as a beautiful place and unique to Los Angeles.

“Art deco buildings and grand mid-century homes amidst a lush coastal backdrop bathing in the sunshine and Pacific breeze,” Devereux says.

“It was the kind of place we really wanted to live in, and now it’s gone. It’ll never be the same.

“We’ve been checking our fire watch apps and a lot of our friends have their ‘go bags’ packed and ready to move.

“Our home was in the red zone last night with another fire close to home, so we’re getting notifications to evacuate but there’s nothing we can do.

“Our friends posted videos from their windows of fire burning just up our street. We just feel for them. It will be very scary. Those fires were moving so, so, fast.

“It’s far from over too. The whole valley is just so dry. It literally has not rained for half a year and the Santa Ana Winds are fierce this time of year,” says Devereux.

“I just know we’re going back to a different place and the impact of this event is going to change people and the city forever.

“Suddenly, there’s 100,000 extra people without a home.

“And all the insurance claims and the cost of replacing the homes alongside the massive cost of living is going to drive people to different cities and states, I feel.

“We’re cutting our trip short and heading back early, but obviously waiting for it to be safe.

“Logistics are going to be interesting, and the aftermath will be a long haul. We’re getting texts about not drinking the tap water so…”

At sunrise during the California fires. Photo supplied Unsplash.com Jessica Christian
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