LAFD Comes Under Scrutiny Over Pre-Deployment Wildfire Plans

Los Angeles Fire Department Chief Kristin Crowley defended the department’s pre-deployment strategies on Wednesday, firing back against a Los Angeles Times article, “L.A. fire officials could have put engines in the Palisades before the fire broke out. They didn’t“earlier this week, contending that the LAFD could have put more crews and fire engines into the Palisades in preparation before the wind event and subsequent fire.

Since January 7th, Los Angeles County has been devastated by several wildfires blazing in different areas of the county. This includes the Palisades Fire, which is currently at around 23,700 acres and has resulted in 9 deaths, over 105,000 evacuated, and 5,300 destroyed structures; and the Eaton Fire, which is currently over 14,100 acres and has caused 17 deaths, 100,000 evacuated, and roughly 7,000 destroyed structures. The Palisades fire is also currently at about 22% containment, with Eaton at about 55% containment.

For a week emergency services, including the LAFD, were widely praised for their efforts in fighting back the fires, containing the fires, and doing their best to save lives and get people out of danger. Following Mayor Karen Bass’ delayed arrival home to LA from an overseas trip, emergency services leaders including Crowley, largely stepped in to help lead the city response.

For the LAFD, things proved especially challenging because of the sheer scope of the Palisades fire, as well as their budget cut by Mayor Bass last year by 17%, causing reduced services. Crews struggled to contain the fire thanks to high winds, dry conditions, and many fire hydrants losing pressure or going dry at critical times. Crowley was also targeted, as she not only told the media that the Mayor’s decision to cut funds hurt their response, but she was also reportedly almost fired by the Mayor for what she said later that day.

Despite that, going into the second week of the fire, crews were making significant progress in containing the Palisades fire, while also keeping up fire services in the city. Crowley was seen as a leading figure in the wildfires.

However, on Wednesday, the new LA Times report alleged that the LAFD could have put more crews and fire engines into the Palisades in preparation before the wind event and subsequent fire. In particular, they noted that many of the crews who worked the day before were not kept on duty the day of the wind event to increase the number of available crews in case of an emergency. Also, only 5 of the more than 40 fire engines available for wildfire use were made ready before the fire, with the LAFD then calling in those same crews and activating the other fire engines after the fire started. The LAT reported that while additional fire engines were pre-deployed into San Fernando Valley and Northeast Los Angeles, no additional engines were sent to the Palisades.

LAFD defends plans

After the report came out, Crowley defended the LAFD’s pre-deployment actions. During a press conference, Chief Crowley noted that everything was pre-deployed like that since the Department couldn’t predict where a major fire would occur. And since high winds could cause damage and need for the LAFD virtually anywhere in the city, the Department had to strategically place everything, as well as keep crews in reserve. The LAFD also received over 3,000 calls on January 7th, about the double the average amount, stretching crews even further. As emergencies were happening all over the city, resources were stretched thin even after maximum deployment.

“We deployed resources in very, very calculated ways throughout the city,” Crowley said on Wednesday. “We’re very system and process-oriented, for the right reasons. We follow a system. We did that. We pre-deployed the necessary resources after the wind forecasts, not knowing where a fire might break out in the city.

“The LAFD pre-deployed the resources on top of what we would normally do. Once the fire erupted, crews went to work. We immediately then utilized all available on-duty, special-duty people that aren’t normally in the field. They surged. They went and staffed every other available resource at that time. The plan that they put together, I stand behind, because we have to manage everybody in the city. We did everything we could.

“We study the weather, we pre-deploy, we have a system in place. The dialogue did occur with my command staff in regard to, what else do we need. What else can we do with the limitations of what we’ve got?”

Others in the LAFD and city government defended the LAFD’s actions on Wednesday, joining Crowley in fighting back the criticism. Los Angeles City Councilman John Lee stressed that many areas in the city were wildfire prone and had wildfires in the past, with resources being sent to those areas as well.

“I spoke to different people within LAFD and received information that we had pre-deployment in our areas,” said Lee. “We were just making sure, that area has unfortunately been prone to wildfires in the past. We will have plenty of time after this to assess what went right, what went wrong. Right now, we’re just focused on, obviously, saving properties, saving lives. And again, as a general public safety, we’re going to bring all that up and make sure that we take a look at all that, different aspects of what happened during this fire.”

“The LAFD obviously did everything they could. They can’t predict if and when fires hit,” said Jack Wesley, a water systems consultant for farms and multi-family homes. “I mean, if they had more of their engines on one side of the city than the other because of some sort of prediction, then the fires went up on the other, that means you’d have all these fire engines racing down freeways against LA traffic. It made more sense to scatter and keep reserves so you could have a big push and fresh crews when needed.

“They will see later on what they did and didn’t do right. But surface level right now, it looks that they did what they could.”