Anger after fire evacuation alert was mistakenly sent to millions of people in Los Angeles

Residents were already on edge as more fires broke out in the Los Angeles region, traumatizing millions of people who feel like after four days there is no end in sight.

Then on Thursday afternoon came another jolt in the form of a text alert.

This was mistakenly sent to all mobile phones in the county, home to some 10 million people, warning them that the fire was near and that they should prepare to evacuate.

Rebecca Alvarez-Petit was on a work video call when her phone started ringing at full volume.

“An EVACUATION WARNING has been issued in your area,” the text message said.

The sound echoed around them as each of their colleagues received the same surprising message.

“It was like a mass panic that I was seeing in real time,” he said.

She and her colleagues began investigating and trying to see if they were in imminent danger.

Instant relief came in the form of a corrected alert telling them to ignore the warning, but this soon gave way to new anger, he said.

“We’re all on pins and needles and we’ve been sitting anxiously by our phones, watching TV, with the radio on, trying to stay as informed as possible because there wasn’t a good system,” Ms. Alvarez said. -Petit, who lives in West Los Angeles.

“And then this. It’s like… you’ve got to be kidding me.”

The death toll from the bushfires has continued to rise with at least 10 people known to have died and that number may rise.

For many, anxiety about saving lives and property has turned into a feeling of frustration over the handling of the fires.

Officials have acknowledged some of the complaints, from hydrants running dry that hampered firefighting efforts to questions about preparedness and investment in fire mitigation.

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass returned to the city from a previously planned trip to Africa to find it in flames. He faced intense questions Thursday about the region’s preparedness, its leadership in this crisis and the water problems that failed firefighters.

“Was I frustrated by this? Absolutely,” Mayor Bass said, responding to a question about water issues and whether the area was sufficiently prepared. He noted that this is an “unprecedented event.”

Like other officials, he noted that the fires were able to spread Tuesday because of strong winds, the same winds that prevented planes from dropping water or fire retardants on the flames. He said urban water systems and neighborhood fire hydrants are not built to put out thousands of acres of fire.

He noted there will be reviews of how the incident unfolded that will examine how officials and agencies handled it.

“When lives and homes have been saved, we will absolutely do an evaluation to look at what worked and what didn’t work, and to correct or hold any agency, department or individual accountable,” he said.

“My focus right now is on lives and homes.”

The evolution of the disaster has become a need to understand why this happened and how it became the most destructive fire in the history of Los Angeles.

When one of five fires burning in Los Angeles County approached Larry Villescas’ home Tuesday, he grabbed the only tool he could: a garden hose.

He and his neighbor made quick work of the embers that fell on their homes from the Eaton Fire and ignited the grass.

Then the hose dried.

He saw his neighbors’ house burn down in Altadena. Then a bang was heard: a nearby house was on fire and sounded like it was exploding. He had to leave.

As he drove away, he saw the fire engulf his garage.

“If we had water pressure, we would have been able to fight it,” said Villescas, standing in front of the charred remains of his house.

He remembered seeing firefighters that night, as the community burned, sitting in their trucks, unable to help.

“I remember my anger. It was like ‘do something,’ but they can’t, there’s no water pressure,” he said. “It’s just infuriating. How could this happen?”

Some experts have said the water shortage is due to unprecedented demand, not mismanagement.

“The problem is that the scope of the disaster is so vast that there are thousands of firefighters and hundreds of fire trucks pumping out water,” Daniel Swain, a climate scientist at the California Water Resources Institute, told the BBC.

“Ultimately, only a limited amount of water can flow through pipes at a time.”

Other neighbors shared their sense that the state was unprepared despite routinely seeing destructive fires.

Hipólito Cisneros, who was inspecting the remains of his now-destroyed home, said public services in the area have needed improvements for years.

“We’ve lived here for 26 years and we’ve never seen it tested,” he says of the fire hydrant at the end of his block that wasn’t drawing water when it was needed most.

Down the street, Fernando González helped his brother sift through the rubble of their home of 15 years.

He noted that his own home in Santa Clarita, about 45 minutes away in Los Angeles County, was also threatened by a different series of wildfires.

“We’ve been on high alert,” he said. “It’s everywhere around us, you know?”