On the night Jan. 7, two fires engulfed west Los Angeles, resulting in many people within the fire hazard zone being called to evacuate with varying levels of warning.

Due to harsh drought conditions and winds north of 80 miles an hour, what began as a small fire in the West Palisades quickly escalated from 10 acres to 23,707 acres. Only a few hours after the Palisades fire began at 10:35 a.m., a second major fire ignited in Eaton at 6:18 p.m., which, while not as expansive, was still incredibly devastating and dangerous.

As of Jan. 31, both fires led to a combined total of 37,496 acres burned, with 12,372 buildings threatened.

Since extinguished, the fires left a combined total of 37,728 acres burned, 29 civilian fatalities, and 10 firefighter injuries. According to fire.ca.gov, due to the Eaton fire a striking, total of 38,608 households were affected.

However, even more staggering is the 43,056 total households that were affected by the Palisades fire. “I could see the fire on the hills from my bedroom window and saw the whole thing happening, so I was able to prepare and evacuate,” said a resident of Sunset Mesa, who did not want her name publicized.

She added, “They updated people on certain websites like recovery.lacounty.gov/palisades-fire/. Mostly, we have relied on each other in WhatsApp chats.”

The livelihoods of many were left completely turned around in the fires’ wake. Some were students who attended schools that burned down. One of these students is Madison Rodriguez, who went to Palisades Charter High School, one of the schools destroyed by the fire.

“My everyday life has changed completely because of the fires. I can’t go to school in person like I used to and for basketball I have to drive myself to all the games instead of taking the school bus with my team,” he said. Rodriguez added, “It’s been hard not seeing my friends every day like I normally would. Everything just feels different and it’s been an adjustment trying to get used to this new routine.”

Rodriguez also had many friends evacuate and lose their homes and all of their belongings but the clothes on their back. Believing that the situation could’ve been handled better, Rodriguez stated that help was too slow and people were not provided the things they needed.

“There should have been better evacuation plans, faster aid, and more effort to prevent so many people from losing everything,” he said.

Levels of warning differed for people depending on where they lived. Some were evacuated as soon as the flames ignited; for others they were alerted later depending on the fire’s path. Rebecca Henning, a long time born and raised LA resident whose parents were required to evacuate, said, “For my parents, who came to my house when they evacuated with their dog, it was extremely scary and stressful.

However, they did have plenty of warning and they were properly prepared with go-bags ready so they knew they had the most important things with them.” Evacuation alerts were sent out to people via phone notifications.

“We knew that there was a fire for a number of hours but once the evacuation notice was on my iPhone, we had about 30 minutes,” stated Monte Baier, a long time Los Angeles resident, who was required to evacuate due to the fires.

Although the fires are now contained, the thousands of people who have lost their homes still mourn with family and neighbors over their now scorched past lives. However, while the origins of these fires remain still unknown, the damage caused is undeniably devastating for the city of Los Angeles and its people.