What is it like to survive after a major fire? From the outside everything looks normal, the houses are still standing, some roofs held up and many walls barely show any trace of what happened, but there are still many families on the outskirts of Los Angeles, one year after the great fires that became California’s worst nightmare. And even though the embers no longer burn, many families have not overcome the trauma of seeing their home on fire. The fire went out, but the ashes and chemical residues are still in the environment because they have not been removed.
An invisible danger
One year ago, as we said, some of the most destructive wildfires in the Los Angeles area occurred. Two wind driven fires caused the deaths of at least 31 people and destroyed nearly 17,000 structures. It was truly tragic. And even though many structures remained intact, the smoke got everywhere.
In neighborhoods like Altadena, many people returned thinking they were lucky because their homes were still standing, but the ventilation grilles and cracks told a different story. It is not just soot, there are remains from cars, plastics, appliances, construction materials. Absolutely everything that burned around them ended up stuck to the walls.
Analyses have detected lead, asbestos, and other chemical compounds well above healthy levels, and breathing them can end up being deadly, especially for people with respiratory or cardiovascular problems, and especially for pregnant women and older people.
Cleaning and cleaning, with no results
Many families did what they were supposed to do in these cases. They called specialized companies, emptied the house, cleaned walls, floors, furniture. Entire weeks of work and thousands of dollars spent, but with insufficient results. Many insurance companies decided to end rental assistance and families were forced to return to what were once their homes. The case of Nina and Billy Malone is one of them. The insurance cut their assistance and since sleeping in their home she wakes up with a very sore throat and headaches. Billy, for his part, has had to start using inhalers to be able to breathe. They say their house smells like an old ashtray.
Living in one of these houses is dangerous. There is still lead and the air is not clean.
When your home stops being a refuge
The symptoms repeat again and again in many residents. Headaches, throat irritation, fatigue, and a lot of anxiety. These neighbors are breathing without knowing whether the air is healthy or not. And we are not talking about one or two cases. Of the 50 homes analyzed by a group of volunteers, 63 percent of the houses show lead levels above those set by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), exceeding healthy levels by almost 60 percent. The trauma did not end with the flames.
Home insurance and…
“They cannot send a company that is not certified to clean things and then expect us to return to our homes,” said one neighbor after investing money in supposedly specialized companies to clean. There are no guaranteed definitive solutions and they are being forced to return to contaminated houses.
It is not just California
Those who lived in Pacific Palisades are also experiencing something similar, and many neighbors are already exhausted from fighting with the California Fair Access to Insurance Requirements Plan over the handling of these fires.
Everything points to the fact that with climate change this type of fire will become more frequent. Hopefully not, of course.
Families are still worried about their homes, surviving the danger does not mean being safe in California…