« May 8, 2007 |
Main
| May 10, 2007 »
Norman Mennes, 90, who lives alone in his house on Commonwealth Avenue, was evacuated by his neighbor Gary Griffitts, 48, as the fire raged. Mennes said he grabbed pictures of his deceased wife, his parents and "a wad of dollar bills."
The retired Los Angeles City College professor who has lived in the neighborhood since 1974 said the sky was a bright orange as flames engulfed the nearby hillside.
"It was very strange to see the whole hillside in flames," he said. "It gave the feeling like it was going to come right over you."
Continue reading "Los Feliz neighbors reunite" »
Smoke from the Griffith Park wildfire combined with wind patterns forecast for this afternoon will likely create unhealthy air-quality conditions for central Los Angeles County, east San Fernando Valley and west San Gabriel Valley, according to air regulators.
People in those areas are urged to avoid outdoor exercise lasting more than an hour, and those with asthma or other lung or heart disease should avoid outdoor activity entirely, said South Coast Air Quality Management District spokesman Sam Atwood. Schools in those areas are also being notified, he said. There are no air quality monitors in Griffith Park.
-Janet Wilson
Dennis Hahn said he and his girlfriend, Erin Wignall, were evacuated about 8:30 p.m. Tuesday from his apartment on the north end of Los Feliz. He said they packed photos, passports, birth certificates and other valuables.
"We go hiking every morning and every night in the park," Hahn said. "It's a real heartbreaker."
The couple returned to the neighborhood Wednesday morning along Commonwealth Avenue to assess the damage. The area was mostly deserted except for a few gardeners and construction workers returning to work.
"We love the park so much," Wignall said. "We're just waiting to see what happens and what we can do to help."
--Sam Quinones
J.R. Wolfstein, 37, worried all night about his missing cat. He had only been able to round up two of his three cats before he, his father, Dr. Ralph Wolfstein, and his mother, Norma, evacuated the home on Cromwell Avenue where they have lived since 1970. The 1924 Spanish-style home by architect Wallace Neff had filled with smoke that rolled like dry ice over the ridge behind it.
Finding the cat was the only thing Wolfstein wasn't able to do. Area hotels were already booked, so in just 20 minutes he managed to borrow a friend's 36-foot Winnebago and stop by an AutoZone and a RadioShack store to equip it with a battery-operated TV set, a charger and other emergency supplies.
He and his parents spent the night parked outside ABC Studios watching the fire on the television.
When they returned to their home this morning, the power was still out and everything, including the pool, was coated with a quarter-inch of ash. But the cat was on the doorstep waiting for breakfast.
-Mary Engel
Architect Elizabeth Eshel saw the flames of the Griffith Park fire from the air as she flew into Burbank's Bob Hope Airport Tuesday night. Meanwhile at home, her husband, Ron, had already bathed their 2-year-old twins and put them to bed when he noticed their neighbors evacuating. The family was reunited at a friend's house in Beechwood Canyon, along with their Ridgeback retriever.
The Eshels bought their 1958 home on Aberdeen Avenue the day they learned Elizabeth was pregnant with Ben and Lucy. The previous owners also had twins.
Back home Wednesday morning, the family praised "Fireman Phil" and other firefighter friends from Department 35 in Los Feliz. But Elizabeth Eshel, who trains for marathons in the park, worried whether her twins would still see rabbits, deer and woodpeckers on their daily nature walks.
"What does a woodpecker say?" she asked the twins as they clamored up and down the front steps. "Tap tap," said Ben.
-Mary Engel
The Captain’s Roost, a popular hiking spot along one of Griffith Park’s most popular trails, is a complete loss. It includes a ledge and a bunch of oak, pine and other trees along the Mt. Hollywood Trail, which offers hardy hikers stunning views from the Pacific Ocean to the San Fernando Valley. All the trees burned, said Los Angeles City Councilman Tom LaBonge.
On Wednesday morning, LaBonge drove carloads of reporters up the closed road to the Observatory parking lot, where several fire trucks remained. Firefighters have a special routine for protecting the Observatory, he said, which reopened last year after a multimillion-dollar renovation.
Some of the scorched chapparal smoldered and helicopters and planes continued to douse the hills with foam. A few deer scurried across the hillside.
LaBonge said that the Observatory had been saved, as well as a patch of 29 trees planted nearby. They were planted in memory of the 29 workers killed in the 1933 Griffith Park fire.
-Amanda Covarrubias
The LAFD said the fire is now 50% contained. Officials now say 817 acres have burned. Because of the progress, about half of the 600 firefighters on scene are being let go.
"Right now, if it goes like this, we are in good shape," said LAPD Capt. Antoine McKnight.
-Amanda Covarrubias
Gabriella Parra, 40, and her son, Tupac Otero, 3, fled their Richland Avenue apartment about 8 p.m. while her husband stayed behind. She said she and her family are regular visitors to the park and that her son particularly enjoyed the carousel and the zoo. "It was really devastating because it has so many memories for us," she said. "Every day we go to the park." Parra said when she picked up her son from school Tuesday he had written on a Mother's day art project: "I love my mommy and daddy because they take me walking to the hills..." As she talked, her son interrupted, "I'm not going hiking anymore because of the fire."
When they left their apartment, Parra said they could see the flames in the hills above the neighborhood. "At that point, it hit me that everything could be burned," she said. Parra, who spent the night along with her son at a friend's house in Cypress Park, said she was happy to learn Wednesday morning that the carousel had been saved. "You just feel relief," she said. "We take him there all the time."
-Anna Gorman
Except for a slight smell of smoke in the air, it was business as usual at Marshall High School, where an evacuation center had operated overnight.
Principal Daniel Harrison said attendance appeared to be down, but only by about 5 percent, and he attributed some of that to incorrect media reports that the school would be closed today. "It's a little bit less than usual, but it's not bad," he said of the attendance drop.
He thought that only a handful of Marshall High students had been evacuated from their homes.
The biggest inconvenience, Harrison said, involved two standardized tests that were scheduled for today. One of them, a makeup version of the state high school exit exam for about 100 students, was canceled and is expected to be rescheduled after consultation with state education officials. The test was canceled because some students were personally affected by the fire and others had been at the school until early today helping at the evacuation center. "We couldn't expect them to score well on a test today," Harrison said.
The other test, for advanced placement calculus, was going ahead, but the school was allowing students to opt out and take it at a later date.
Because of some concerns about smoke, the school would not be holding any rigorous physical education classes today, giving students other options including watching sports training videos.
Harrison has been in the job for just one week. His first day was May 1, when other schools saw student walkouts for immigration rallies. Marshall High did not experience any walkouts but a week later was dealing with the fire. "It's been an exciting introduction to Marshall High," Harrison said.
-Larry Gordon
 L.A. Fire Department chief Doug Barry said he was hoping firefighters could fully contain the fire by this evening. There are more than a dozens choppers and planes in the air dropping water and fire retardant on hot spots. Some inmate crews are working the lines, too. Fresh firefighters should arrive in Griffith Park around 11 a.m.
-Amanda Covarrubias
|
|
