{"id":7412,"date":"2025-01-07T22:01:00","date_gmt":"2025-01-07T22:01:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/investingsstrategist.com\/index.php\/2025\/01\/07\/wildfires-are-breaking-out-in-southern-california-as-the-most-destructive-windstorm-in-over-a-decade-hits\/"},"modified":"2025-01-07T22:01:00","modified_gmt":"2025-01-07T22:01:00","slug":"wildfires-are-breaking-out-in-southern-california-as-the-most-destructive-windstorm-in-over-a-decade-hits","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/investingsstrategist.com\/index.php\/2025\/01\/07\/wildfires-are-breaking-out-in-southern-california-as-the-most-destructive-windstorm-in-over-a-decade-hits\/","title":{"rendered":"Wildfires are breaking out in Southern California as the \u2018most destructive windstorm\u2019 in over a decade hits"},"content":{"rendered":"

Editor\u2019s note: Find the latest coverage of the Pacific Palisades wildfire <\/em>here<\/em>.<\/em> <\/p>\n

Wildfires began breaking out in Southern California Tuesday morning as a life-threatening, widespread windstorm that could be one of the most destructive to hit the region in over a decade roars to life and creates extremely dangerous fire weather conditions. <\/p>\n

Here are the latest updates: <\/p>\n

\u2022 Hollywood Hills fire: <\/strong>A smaller fire broke out near Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles county\u2019s Hollywood Hills around the same time on Tuesday morning, according to the Los Angeles Fire Department. <\/p>\n

\u2022 Rare warning:<\/strong> Los Angeles and Ventura counties are under a rare, \u201cparticularly dangerous situation\u201d red flag warning, the most dire such warning issued by the National Weather Service, for a high risk for dangerous fire weather conditions Tuesday afternoon until Wednesday afternoon. \u201cWidespread damaging winds and low humidities will likely cause fire starts to rapidly grow in size with extreme fire behavior,\u201d the NWS warned. <\/p>\n

\u2022 Hundreds of thousands could lose power: <\/strong>Power shutoffs are possible as Southern California\u2019s energy providers try to prevent damaged infrastructure from starting blazes. More than 400,000 of Southern California Edison\u2019s 5 million customers may have their power shut off in the coming days, according to the utility\u2019s website. <\/p>\n

Destructive windstorm fueling fire threat<\/h2>\n

Meteorologists with the National Weather Service in Los Angeles used the most dire language possible to characterize the windstorm fueling the fire threat. The \u201clife-threatening\u201d windstorm \u201cwill likely be the most destructive\u201d since a 2011 event \u201cthat did extensive damage to Pasadena and nearby foothills of the San Gabriel Valley,\u201d the weather service warned. <\/p>\n

The 2011 windstorm downed hundreds of trees and knocked out power for days because the seasonally strong Santa Ana winds dipped into more populous, lower elevation areas typically sheltered from them. <\/p>\n

That will be the case again with this event. Many areas of Los Angeles and eastern Ventura counties, including portions of the Los Angeles basin and San Gabriel Valley, are at risk of damaging hurricane-force wind gusts of 50 to 80 mph Tuesday afternoon into early Wednesday. Gusts between 80 and 100 mph are likely in higher elevation areas. <\/p>\n

Winds will \u201caccelerate to dangerous levels\u201d starting Tuesday afternoon, according to the NWS. High wind warnings are in effect through at least Wednesday for much of Southern California. The strong winds will likely result in widespread downed trees as well as widespread power outages. <\/p>\n

Winds will also be strong enough to bring down power lines, which could spark fires. Any fire starts during this time could quickly turn into an out-of-control blaze. <\/p>\n

Extreme dryness during what is typically the wettest time of the year is also helping to drive the fire threat. <\/p>\n

Southern California has grown progressively more dry since late summer after fall and winter storms targeted the Pacific Northwest. <\/p>\n

While last winter was a boon for Southwest rain and snow, the weather pendulum has swung to the other side of the spectrum this winter \u2014 a phenomenon becoming more common as the planet warms and weather patterns flip from one extreme to the other more frequently. <\/p>\n

Drought in much of Southern California jumped to moderate in late December, including most of Los Angeles County, which had been drought-free since March 2023. <\/p>\n

Vegetation is drier than normal across the region as a result and more prone to fire starts and spread, according to the National Interagency Fire Center. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n

This post appeared first on cnn.com<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Editor\u2019s note: Find the latest coverage of the Pacific Palisades wildfire here. Wildfires began breaking out in Southern California Tuesday morning as a life-threatening, widespread windstorm that could be one of the most destructive to hit the region in over a decade roars to life and creates extremely dangerous fire weather conditions. Here are the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":7413,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7412","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/investingsstrategist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7412","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/investingsstrategist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/investingsstrategist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/investingsstrategist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7412"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/investingsstrategist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7412\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/investingsstrategist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7413"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/investingsstrategist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7412"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/investingsstrategist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7412"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/investingsstrategist.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7412"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}