Opinion: Wildfires Underscore California’s Growing Threat of Disaster as Climate Changes
Southern California’s disaster again demonstrates that while wildfires were once mostly confined to rural timbered areas during summer and fall months, a warming climate means they can and do strike anywhere and anytime, including residential neighborhoods in the middle of winter.
Hollywood thrives on depictions of desperate battles against overwhelming forces of destruction.
A real life version, the equal of any cinematic disaster film, is raging today. Wildfires, driven by fierce Santa Ana winds blowing off the desert, are sweeping through Los Angeles County neighborhoods, most prominently and destructively in Pacific Palisades, home to many film industry stars.
Thousands of residents have fled as thousands of acres of lavish, multimillion-dollar homes and lush foliage have been scorched, with at least two deaths reported so far.
As of noon, the fires were uncontrolled and firefighters were reporting that many water hydrants were unusable due to a shortage of water.
“We woke up to a dark cloud over all of Los Angeles, but it is darkest for those who are most intimately impacted by these fires,” said LA County Supervisor Lindsey Horvath.
No one knows how far the fires will reach before being controlled. Movies come to a climactic end, but the outcome of this catastrophe is as dark as the Southland skies.
Just a few days earlier, Gov. Gavin Newsom released a very upbeat video looking back at 2024 in California. But today he was on scene in Southern California, praising outgoing President Joe Biden for immediately offering aid with “no politics, no handwringing.”
However, Biden’s successor, Donald Trump, who will take office in less than a fortnight, didn’t sympathize with California. Instead, he issued another blast at Newsom, one of his fiercest critics and a potential 2028 presidential candidate.
“Governor Gavin Newscum refused to sign the water restoration declaration put before him that would have allowed millions of gallons of water, from excess rain and snow melt from the north to flow daily into many parts of California, including the areas that are currently burning in a virtually apocalyptic way,” Trump posted on his Truth Social website. “He wanted to protect an essentially worthless fish called a smelt, by giving it less water (it didn’t work), but didn’t care about the people of California.”
Will a President Trump be as generous with firefighting and reconstruction aid as Biden? He was quite helpful — and drew praise from Newsom — when the Camp fire destroyed the town of Paradise in 2018. But that was before Newsom began building a national political image as a harsh critic.
Politics aside, Southern California’s disaster again demonstrates that while wildfires were once mostly confined to rural timbered areas during summer and fall months, a warming climate means they can and do strike anywhere and anytime, including residential neighborhoods in the middle of winter.
While Northern California has experienced strong winter rain and snow storms of late, Southern California has been bone dry, making it extremely vulnerable when Santa Ana winds stream from the region’s deserts during winter months. Local authorities had warned that the lack of rain and the onset of Santa Anas posed a particularly high threat of disaster and their nightmares became reality.
There is one more aspect of the catastrophe that will be persist long after the fires are extinguished — whenever that happens.
Fire insurance payouts will be particularly heavy due to the value of the homes being consumed, bolstering the insurance industry’s growing unwillingness to write policies in California under the current regulatory system. Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara, with support from Newsom, has proposed a major overhaul that would allow insurers to include projections of future losses and the cost of reinsurance in their premiums if they agree to continue writing policies in fire-prone areas.
If implemented, the new regulations would very likely lead to premium increases, which draws the ire of some consumer activists. But having such insurance is not optional in the real world, and without it, the residential real estate market could be doomed.
CalMatters is a public interest journalism venture committed to explaining how California’s state Capitol works and why it matters.
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