Strategy, meals and laundry: The monumental effort behind LA's firefight
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On a recent day fighting the Los Angeles wildfires, a fire crew's radios crackled to life, warning of nearby flames as helicopter blades thudded overhead. Juan Tapia — an experienced firefighter from Morelia, Mexico — tore out scrub brush as tall as himself, just days after arriving in California. And Karley Desrosiers, fresh from British Columbia, scrambled to communicate the latest update on the fire to an anxious public.
As wildfires burn across the Los Angeles area, the operation to save homes and people — from those on the fire line to the logistics of feeding thousands of firefighters — is monumental. The Eaton and Palisades fires that sparked last week in the Los Angeles area have killed at least 25 people and destroyed thousands of homes. They could be some of the costliest wildfires in U.S. history, and required the mobilization of immense firefighting power from across the North American continent.
From Portland to Houston, hundreds of out-of-state firefighters said goodbye to their families and loaded into engines bound for Los Angeles. Over 1,000 inmates in California filed onto hand crews in prison orange. Water bombers with “Quebec” stamped across their side swept over the blazes, as a Mexican fire brigade touched down and set to work. Nearly two dozen from the Navajo Scouts, a Bureau of Indian Affairs-managed program, joined the fight.
