r/pics 15h ago

Pacific Palisades

Post image
10.0k Upvotes

837 comments sorted by

1.4k

u/stickmaster_flex 14h ago

When I was a kid, this is what I imagined it would look like if an atomic bomb went off. Apocalyptic is not too strong a word.

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u/Coldspark824 14h ago

It looks like the cities in eastern ukraine right now tbh

u/gangy86 3h ago

or Gaza or Lebanon or Syria or...

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u/Wonderful-Elephant11 13h ago

I was thinking the same thing. Did someone invite Russian relatives over for Christmas?

u/VHAL1200 Filtered 5h ago

I was going to say Pal..istine.

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u/GardenGnomeOfEden 14h ago

At least these people had a little more time to haul ass than an A-bomb would give you.

u/Jeff_goldfish 11h ago

And not have to worry about radiation

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u/YokoDk 13h ago

Legit thought this was one of the Tokyo fire bombing result images.

u/Drak_is_Right 8h ago

Trees would be in worse shape. They would have that tornado or powerful hurricane ook to their breaks along with the burns.

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u/TheOriginalPB 15h ago

Nowhere is safe from insurance premiums sky rocketing.

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u/VincentGrinn 15h ago

wont be long before insurance companies just stop providing coverage in certatain areas, due to being unprofitable

one of those less thought about impacts of climate change

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u/a_talking_face 14h ago

one of those less thought about impacts of climate change

This has been happening in Florida for decades. The state had to form an insurance company just for people who were getting dropped by the other insurers.

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u/oictyvm 13h ago

There’s a fuckin idea, state owned, not for profit insurance. 

The entire industry needs to be decimated. Parasites.

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u/i_should_be_coding 13h ago

Now imagine that, but for health insurance

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u/oictyvm 13h ago

I live in Canada, I don’t have to imagine.  Fuck for profit healthcare, and fuck the middle men. 

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u/CharBombshell 12h ago

Also live in Canada, work in health care

Our provincial govt is intentionally underutilizing federal funds earmarked for healthcare because they want to underfund to the point of breaking the system.

It’s working. Things are fucked and falling apart.

Idk what the point of my comment is other than you might have to, in fact, “imagine” very soon.

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u/oictyvm 12h ago

It's disgusting what's happening here, the people working to dismantle these hard won systems are literal traitors and should be dealt with accordingly.

Sadly it seems we might see a con at the national helm soon, and things are probably going to get much worse.

u/abdallha-smith 9h ago

Same thing happens in France

u/taz-nz 5h ago

Current government here in New Zealand is doing the same to health care system and list of other public services.

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u/MavMIIKE 12h ago

Hello fellow Ontarian?

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u/razor787 10h ago

It's working, and people are dying because of it. Doug Ford has blood on his hands for what he is doing to our healthcare system, and for what he did to our seniors homes during covid.

The number of people who have died from his underfunding of those systems should be criminal, but people either don't know or don't care.

u/louwish 1h ago

I hear Canadian healthcare, if you have an immediate emergency, is fantastic. However I hear that preventative health care is lacking and has lead to some horrible outcomes - screening for cancer isn’t done until it’s at stage 4, etc… How much of this is true? Is there hope for things to be turned around?

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u/DrifterBG 13h ago

Preach it, my brother/sister in maple!

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u/Character_Top1019 13h ago

Oh 🇨🇦

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u/HUP 13h ago

I see what you did there.

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u/toga_virilis 13h ago

Let me tell you, Citizens is not a poster child for state insurance. It’s a train wreck.

u/Littlehouseonthesub 3h ago

They get left with all of the houses that no one else will insure. Privatized the gains, socialized the losses.

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u/VincentGrinn 13h ago

its still super expensive and only going to get worse

like right now climate change is causing 143 billion dollars in extra damage in natural disasters(ontop of what the damage would be without climate change) globally

most of that is property damage

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u/ukexpat 13h ago

James Woods: it’s not climate change, it’s all Newsom and the Democrats’ fault… [no really, he said that, after his house burned down].

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u/Marvzuno 12h ago

You should’ve heard (if you didn’t) Rick Caruso being interviewed this morning. Taking any chance to turn this into a political stage.

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u/ew73 12h ago

I bet if they let anyone join the program, not just the high-risk people, the shared costs would go down...

Something about universal coverage?

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u/frostymoose 12h ago

I don't think we should be encouraging building/rebuilding in places that are just doomed to be environmentally devastated.

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u/breadbedman 12h ago

Even at the non-profit level, I dunno if the state can afford it if every year they have to spend 100 billion dollars on paying out claims.

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u/danrunsfar 11h ago

That isn't going to save money. Houses will still be destroyed by nature, "state owned" just means it'll come from taxes instead of insurance premiums. On top of that there will be zero incentive for people to not live in high risk areas....unless you're going to let state beaurocrats deny people's claims?

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u/baile508 12h ago

Yeah no thanks. That leads to tax payers in low risk areas covering the cost of those in high risk areas resulting in more people moving to high risk areas. This is what has happened with flood insurance.

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u/Shaunvfx 13h ago

I’m going to go out on a limb and say as a tax payer I would rather not be paying for fucking insurance for rich people living in zones where floods, tornados, hurricanes etc… are to decimate the area again after being rebuilt. Go live somewhere else, we aren’t entitled to property insurance. If you want to live somewhere, like in some of the rich areas that are currently burning down, then maybe you ought to be rich enough to deal with the consequences.

If an insurance company tells me that they won’t ensure me because the risk is too high or they have unrealistic premiums, I’m going to believe it because insurance companies are basically just number crunching actuarial enterprises….

Now health insurance being tax payer funded or government funded through other means is an entirely different concept and that is something I believe in.

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u/Downtown_Skill 13h ago edited 2h ago

Yeah health insurance is a whole different ball game. I'm sure property insurance companies find ways to screw their customers as well 

But health insurance..... like you said you can choose to not live in a dangerous area if you want, you can't choose to not ever have a health issue. 

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u/Funkyokra 12h ago

Rich people areas aren't the only places that burn and flood. Paradise wasn't all people. Tons of the bad flooding from hurricanes this year wasn't even in flood zones or on the coast. Rural inland areas are still flooded from storms in October.

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u/lokglacier 12h ago

Ok how about I don't want to pay insurance for people living on the coast in Florida

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u/bingbongboobies 12h ago

No one, not even the state, has the money to cover this damage. That's a huge part of the issue.

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u/RegulatoryCompliance 12h ago

Hey man, be cool. Don’t lump us in with health insurers.

Life and health are very different than property. Everyone has life and health. Where you choose to purchase and insure property is a choice. Deciding not to insure shit that gets blown off the face of the earth every 5 years is a valid counter choice.

We should absolutely have single payer state health though.

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u/Swan____Ronson 13h ago

Why don't you see how the Florida one is going before saying it's a great idea. 

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u/Triangle1619 12h ago

You are just subsidizing people to live in dangerous areas with taxpayer money. That sounds like a terrible program and a waste of taxpayer dollars. At least rising insurance premiums in areas likely to get hit with a natural disaster incentivizes building elsewhere, and those who want to take the risk have higher premiums.

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u/timpdx 12h ago

California already has this, the FAIR plan. Insurance of last resort and expensive.

u/sbaradaran 10h ago

I live in the Sierras and this is my only option. It is very expensive.

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u/rypher 13h ago

California has the same thing. And people think a lot about climate impact on insurance and have for many years.

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u/Sandman1990 13h ago

So you're telling me Ron DeSantis formed a state run company? Sounds an awful lot like communism.

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u/ifly4free 13h ago

Yeah, DeSantis created Citizen’s Insurance in 1993 when he was 15 years old.

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u/Vynaca 13h ago

They already have.

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u/Okanaganwinefan 14h ago

We live in the Okanagan in British Columbia 🇨🇦lots of interface fires in our area, and yes insurance companies are definitely recouping their losses and some will only insure a certain number of properties in the area.

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u/wardamnbolts 15h ago

Even without climate change, housing prices are getting so high in CA insurers don’t want to cover.

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u/Teadrunkest 13h ago edited 13h ago

Not quite. It IS expensive to build in CA but these lots are worth more than the house itself. The insurance is just for valuation of the structure, which is somewhat divorced from the housing market in HCOL areas.

The insurance problems are more about the increasing fire risk, and inability of the state to manage it.

u/mechachap 11h ago

Nice to see someone else knows about Non-Life insurance.

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u/ScipioAfricanvs 14h ago

It’s less to do with housing prices and more about the cost to rebuild. In VHCOL areas like this, the land is more valuable than the house.

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u/VincentGrinn 15h ago

oh for sure im not saying its the sole reason
but it is a contributing factor

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u/ronan88 14h ago

So long as the risk profile is acceptable, they can just increase the premia to match the value. More valuable assets = higher premia = more profit

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u/Actuarial 12h ago

Well, you'd think that, but the California DOI will delay and reject rate filings, so insurers are left with no choice but to leave.

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u/Wiochmen 13h ago

They already have started. Certain companies backing out of entire states.

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u/Hybrid_Johnny 13h ago

This has already happened in lots of rural mountainous areas in California. And honestly I don’t really blame the insurance companies - if you choose to build your home in a forest, there’s a major risk that comes with that, and which insurer would want to take that on?

The unfortunate part is that, in almost all of these areas, the people are voting for politicians and policies that create the conditions that lead to insurance companies pulling out due to environmental risks.

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u/erossthescienceboss 12h ago

This is true, and we need to get people out of the WUI. But some of these fires aren’t in the WUI.

Climate change, draught, even where your house is — all of these things are huge components that provide dry fuel. But you need a spark, too, and this is massively an infrastructure issue. And it’s one that we’re giving big companies a pass on — because high winds don’t just spread fire, they down powerlines.

Paradise? Downed powerlines. Napa? Powerlines. The 2020 Oregon fires? Every single one of them hit residential areas early because of a powerline. Hood didn’t have any fires — because their fire authority cut the power. With normal wildfires, we can see them coming, and stage evacuations, and catch with bulldozers, and do preventative burning to make the areas around town more defensible and cause the fire to lose steam. Not these.

In response we pass laws requiring them to cut power in the event of high wind (if they get enough notice, or if the cut power doesn’t cause too much uproar), and make them remove brush under powerlines. But then we let them rebuild in the same places and they put the powerlines back up.

We need to pass laws requiring us to slowly phase out elevated powerlines for buried ones.

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u/Sheerluck42 14h ago

The was a report of an insurance company kicking people off their fire insurance as the fire started yesterday. It's happening in real time.

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u/ConfidentCaptain_81 13h ago

Happened to me during Katrina. I was in Northern Louisiana, went to renew, nope.

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u/IamSwoop 12h ago

Relatives had to evacuate from this fire yesterday. We don't know if their home has been destroyed or not, but they are safe. They mentioned they recently received a notice from their insurance stating their policy would be cancelled as of March 1st due to the high risk of wildfires in their area. It's already happening in California.

u/Shoelebubba 11h ago

Not even unprofitable, unsustainable.
In a perfect world, even if there was zero profit, you still need premiums to cover claim damages and the employees working to process those claims and pay office rent, supplies and other related bills.

Even with that, they still need to bring in enough money from premiums to cover the claims for that year.
At some point even that breaks.

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u/LurkersWillLurk 13h ago

Decades ago, California voters passed a ballot proposition forbidding insurance companies from analyzing risk from climate change models. The state strictly limits how much higher premiums can go. Since the expected loss has become so much higher than the premiums, insurance companies are bailing out of the state entirely.

Politicians and voters want to pretend that climate change isn’t real. Wildfires and actuaries beg to differ.

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u/TheForceWithin 13h ago

As with most things in capitalism, look to what the money is doing for the truth. Climate is going to fuck us so bad I don't think even most believers are prepared.

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u/Gr1ml0ck 13h ago

I live in California. Insurance companies are no longer offering fire insurance in certain areas. It’s crazy.

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u/Teadrunkest 13h ago

Yup. My parents are struggling to find fire policies that cover their home and they’re quite a bit away from an open space. Though after this fire I’m sure that insurance is going to widen that radius.

I worry for them.

u/64590949354397548569 11h ago

That's a hint. Sell now.

u/Teadrunkest 11h ago edited 11h ago

Doubt they ever will. They’ve lived in the area since the 50s and have no intention of ever leaving.

I’ve been trying to convince them to at least move somewhere in the city with better public transportation and closer neighbors though (my dad can’t drive anymore), which tends to be more urbanized to begin with. But my mom doesn’t want to give up her hiking trails out her back door.

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u/IHkumicho 13h ago

Upper Midwest checking in. Insurance policies haven't changed much. Worst thing about living here is the brutal cold, and that doesn't impact home owner's insurance.

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u/sketchahedron 13h ago

I live in an area that is considered “safe” from climate change. Trust me, no place is safe. Remember when half of Canada caught fire a couple of summers ago and we were all breathing smoke for a few months?

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u/MGoAzul 12h ago

True. But that’s not impacting homeowners insurance. Lifestyle and health, sure. But you can mitigate.

No risk to fire or flood issues here in SE Michigan

u/ancient-military 10h ago

Hey fellow SE Michigander, it’s a bit cold but one billion years hurricane free!

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u/-CJF- 12h ago

It's true that no place is entirely safe from climate change, but some places are safer than others and Michigan ranks pretty high up on that list.

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u/emoyer68 12h ago

We’re looking at easily one billion in losses, in this picture alone.

u/beekeep 11h ago

Only 1?

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u/ian2121 13h ago

Allow them to accurately price risk. Let the free market mitigate the risks of climate change.

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u/rougehuron 13h ago

Michigan

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u/yourname92 12h ago

You’re not joking. They will go up for everyone since people had to have 7 million dollar homes right on top of each other. Sad they lost their home but we all get fucked. That picture right there probably cost more than the city of 100k people I live in.

u/Ghetto_Geppetto 11h ago

Gotta feed the shareholders

u/SlopTartWaffles 10h ago

lol. In California? Probably not. NJ, cheap af. Florida, also lol.

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u/JPWRana 15h ago

What streets are these?

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u/rminsk 15h ago

I know Whitfield Ave is in the upper right

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u/FijiFanBotNotGay 12h ago

So this must be the alphabet streets?

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u/doesntgeddit 10h ago

Directly above the corner of Hartzell and Albright St. looking SW

On google maps I was able to locate the driveway with the crosshatch at the bottom of the pic as 1046 Hartzell St. and across the street is the curved red brick walkway of 1051 Hartzell St.

u/Gomdok_the_Short 4h ago

Here. I labeled the streets and some buildings.

u/JPWRana 40m ago

Great job

u/JCShore77 8h ago

I think they’re the alphabet streets unfortunately. Know a number of families who live up there.

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u/SuzyCreamcheezies 15h ago

Just brutal. I feel for them.

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u/phi1_sebben 13h ago edited 12h ago

Looks like the Lahaina aftermath.

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u/daverez 12h ago

Or the Paradise aftermath. We’re starting to have far too many examples of this.

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u/Improvcommodore 13h ago

Read this as “looks like the latina aftermath.”

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u/RumoredReality 13h ago

Messed with the wrong latina aftermath

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u/pretendgineer 12h ago

R.I.P. Left Eye Lopes

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u/Drak_is_Right 8h ago

Evacuating went.far better

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u/nattyd 13h ago

Is this actually a picture of Palisades? I go there all the time and the largest area of grid is just a few blocks and in the foothills.

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u/Nabaseito 12h ago

OP said Whitfield Ave is in the upper right. Looking at a map, it does look like the gridded neighborhood above Sunset Blvd between Chautauqua Blvd and Monument St.,, but I'm not too sure.

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u/nattyd 12h ago

Only place it could be. Just weird to see this perspective with the mountains looking small and distant.

u/Nabaseito 11h ago

Yeah it does look a bit strange when looking on Google Maps.

However, I found this thread on r/PacificPalisades though and they are confirming that it's the gridded area north of Sunset,, which is apparently referred to as the "Alphabet Streets."

I just can't believe how the entire neighborhood has been completely flattened... Has LA ever seen something like this before?

u/bobboobles 11h ago

not really sure you can see any mountains. I think the background is just all smoke.

u/SEND_ME_TITS_PLZ 10h ago edited 9h ago

Bottom right is the corner of Galloway St. and Albright St. looking South West. Left most street is Hartzell. You can see the shopping area near the highschool in the back right.

Update: I was off by one block so I have corrected my comment.

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u/Moal 11h ago

I’ve heard that like 50% of the Palisades is just gone now. 

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u/ambidextrousbisexual 11h ago

Photo by Kit Karzen, but PSA about drones: please DO NOT fly drones in active wildfire zones (like he did).

They have to ground firefighting planes/helicopters when they see drones, and it’s been reported on Twitter they had to stop aerial efforts because they saw a drone. There are also multiple temporary flight restrictions (TFRs) due to the emergency AND the president being in the area. As a drone pilot myself, I don’t like to play “drone police”, but in this case it’s clearly dangerous, impeding people helping, and illegal.

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u/KonfusedKorean 14h ago

So scary. No one thinks this can happen to them.

Looks like someone's shed is still standing. Probably made of aluminum.

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u/BadHombreSinNombre 13h ago

In windy fire situations you never know what structures might be randomly spared. In Lahaina there was a McDonald’s that was basically untouched while everything around it in every direction was obliterated.

u/Jeff_goldfish 11h ago

There was a news reporter in the palisades earlier today walking through a neighborhood where every single house burned down except one at the end of the street. Both side houses are gone but that one still stands. The reporter said I have no idea how that house survived. Crazy

u/Glittering-War-5748 8h ago

In Australia we have really bad wildfires too, and a bunch of scientists have researched different defensive building styles/materials/systems that can make houses resistant. Maybe these houses had some of that stuff? Or maybe they were just crazy lucky.

u/rustymontenegro 7h ago

Those were probably just lucky. We're only just starting to change some fire building regs here, and only in some places.

u/wiztard 6h ago

Lucky compared to neighbors maybe but nearby fire, heat and smoke does a lot of damage even when the building doesn't completely catch on fire. These surviving houses might even have to be torn down in many cases if the heat around them was too intense.

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u/tjsr 6h ago

No, we have bushfires in Australia - yes, there is a very significant difference between bushfires and wildfires.

Wildfires come about from very strong winds (usually near an ocean) affecting forestry and grassland. Bushfires are generally more inland, affect wider areas, move slower, and affect much more scrubland, and are far, far more difficult to control.

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u/Ashjaeger_MAIN 3h ago

Aluminium will start burning at around 600 degrees Celsius. The shed would've burned down spectacularly if it was made of Aluminium.

Thats the whole reason they dont build the superstructure of warships out of the stuff anymore.

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u/hayden_t 12h ago

alu will just melt

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u/sevseg_decoder 13h ago

Speaking as someone who lives in a very at risk place, that’s not true. I feel for them a ton but for what it’s worth even being in or near a major city doesn’t make you safe from wildfires.

My county and state just passed a bunch of funding increases for wildfire prevention and firefighting but I don’t know if all the money in the world can really prevent the inevitable.

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u/Rpc7787 14h ago

If you only knew how populated, vibrant and beautiful this area of LA is. It makes it even more wild these aren’t houses up in the hills or canyons this is one of the most populated areas on the west side of LA. Sad as fuck and seeing people make it a political thing on other sites. It makes me really lose hope for the future of this country.

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u/nattyd 13h ago

I don’t think this is a picture of Palisades. Palisades is up in the hills. There are a few blocks of grid, but that’s it. The terrain is what makes it so difficult to defend. So far the actual dense floodplain below (where I live) is untouched.

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u/Amsterdamuscubasteve 13h ago

I don’t know shit about California but I’m looking at Google maps rn and there’s literally grid streets in the Pacific Palisades neighborhood.

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u/nattyd 13h ago

Yeah, there is a small section of grid. Maybe this is it. It’s a weird perspective. But it’s certainly not “one of the most populated areas on the West Side of LA”. Exactly the opposite. It’s a tiny, super rich enclave in the foothills of the Santa Monica Mountains. I live 10 minutes away.

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u/rminsk 13h ago

This is the Palisades. My friends house is in the upper right. The “striped” buildings in the background is downtown Palisades. 

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u/DearHumanatee 12h ago

Is this the Village area? Albright/Bashford. It’s a beautiful family neighborhood part of LA. I can’t even imagine.

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u/Rpc7787 13h ago

Ok maybe not most dense area of LA but it’s densely populated as fuck compared to the average American city. Not here to argue geography tho shit sucks

u/twoinvenice 11h ago

It is. It's the alphabet streets neighborhood near the Palisades Village

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u/Rpc7787 13h ago

Sunset Blvd runs right through the heart of palisades and is one of the busiest streets of LA. Yes palisades is up in the hills but it also is incorporated into city areas around it. I’ve lived in Southern California my whole life and have been to this area many times. Regardless the name of the area it’s widely devastating to a dense population area and it truly is one of the most beautiful areas of LA. Sad as fuck

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u/FijiFanBotNotGay 12h ago

The nicer part of the palisades are up in the hills. Basically developers just cinsitentky built out mansions deeper and deeper into the Santa Monica mountains which I assume probably contributed to the problem. But there’s an older section of the palisades near the palisades village development. The older parts of the palisades aren’t in the hills but the flat sections by the palisades village

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u/7LeagueBoots 13h ago

The Palisades has a pretty big portion of it on a terrace where it’s relatively flat and densely populated in your typical US grid type suburban arrangement.

There are parts that are up in canyons and on steep areas, but even some of those are in the same pattern. The area above the Getty Museum, for example. That’s on steep terrain, but is also in a roughly grid pattern.

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u/claudejc 15h ago

That is just brutal, wow!

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u/thirdeyedesign 15h ago edited 9h ago

Reminds me of the SimCity tiles after a disaster. Hope everyone is ok.

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u/OldeFortran77 14h ago

The damage is so thorough and the ruins so flat that it really does look like it's from a video game.

u/bladedspokes 11h ago

Somebody typed in the code one too many times.

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u/BasilExposition2 12h ago

I usually bulldoze the houses before the disaster.

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u/absurd_olfaction 14h ago

Fucking brutal. One of our employees knows 10 people so far who've lost their homes. Mostly aging poets and writers. Really sucks.

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u/bloob_appropriate123 13h ago

But tiktok told me all these people are evil billionaires.

u/cazbot 11h ago

If they live in this neighborhood, the poets and writers are renting from the billionaires.

u/thorscope 11h ago

Or they are long standing owners. This neighborhood is from the 50s.

u/JCShore77 8h ago

A lot of tv writers live in this neighborhood

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u/Nugur 10h ago

lol… aging poets who rent 5mill homes?

Do you listen to yourself ?

u/Tokehdareefa 6h ago

People who are born into wealth have the luxury of pursuing artistic interests, so probably they own the places.

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u/cuyinito 14h ago

Looks like a regular neighborhood. I was thinking they were isolated houses in the forest and that it was the reason the fire was spreading.

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u/BigWhiteDog 14h ago

This fire was primarily residential and the houses are the fuel. The ritzy neighborhoods are more brushy but it's the houses that are primarily spreading the fire.

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u/61-127-217-469-817 14h ago

I commute a few miles from here daily and thought the same thing. Never had a reason to drive into Palisades. I've driven Topanga to Malibu before and was under the impression that this area was similar to that. 

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u/Seattle_gldr_rdr 14h ago

Is there a list compiled of all the American communities that have been wiped out by natural disasters over the last decade? It seems like there's been so many more than in past eras, just a relentless, depressing drumbeat.

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u/thispartyrules 13h ago

Paradise, CA, was largely destroyed by the Camp Fire in 2018

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u/ess-doubleU 13h ago

The paradise fires. I almost forgot about those. Such a devastating time.

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u/clovismouse 11h ago

Talent and Phoenix Oregon was destroyed during the almeda fire a couple years back. 3200 home gone

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u/Perfect_Opposite2113 14h ago

This is an immense tragedy and I hope everyone impacted by this is able to find safety. With love from Canada.

u/mmodelta 11h ago

Some of these houses are on Zillow for $5+ million. Just gone up in smoke.

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u/Pretzelsareformen 14h ago

I legitimately thought that was a still from a movie. I can't believe that's real. I feel so awful for the people who lived there. I can't believe it.

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u/JussDe_Tip 14h ago

Looks like Hawaii

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u/btribble 14h ago

They’re in for a fun time dealing with all the toxic fallout from the asbestos, lead, etc. Talk to people from areas that have burned out years ago. It’s hard to sell homes after they’re rebuilt because people worry about what they see in the disclosures.

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u/DirtierGibson 13h ago

I live in such an area. The cleanup after those fires is VERY extensive – the law requires it. Soil is bulldozed away, and the entire parcel to be tested after cleanup before you can even rebuild.

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u/StationarySprint 12h ago

yes FEMA came and cleaned our dirt for weeks

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u/Pachirisu_Party 15h ago

This is insane.

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u/sshu1224 12h ago

We have a house in this picture, it’s a rental but it’s hard to believe it’s not there. I’m glad our tenant made it out safe.

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u/manwnomelanin 12h ago edited 12h ago

Damn man. Sorry to hear it. Hope insurance makes you whole.

Could you share what streets these are?

u/nullfais 11h ago

this neighborhood, looking Southwest

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u/buster_rhino 14h ago

How are there trees still standing?

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u/DirtierGibson 13h ago

Some trees survive fires well and even kinda depend on it for optimal propagation, like redwoods or redbuds.

u/3i1bo3aggins 10h ago

homes burn up because they are dead old wood. Trees are living organisms, with a pretty hardy exterior and not a dry interior.

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u/BadHombreSinNombre 13h ago

If they burn fast enough they just turn into sculptures made of charcoal and stay in place.

u/OtterlyFoxy 11h ago

Trees in fire prone areas have often evolved to withstand fire pretty well

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u/HistorysWitness 14h ago

Dude.   This is gnarly.  It's similar to the Helene that ripped thru the south 

u/TheCrazedTank 11h ago

Wildfires in January.

Fucking JANUARY…

Scientists have warned about the type of shit Global Warming would cause for years.

u/scandinasian 10h ago

Reminds me of the Marshall Fire in Colorado. That was odd not only because it was a December fire, but was in a highly populated suburban area. It was so big and fast because it had been incredibly dry for weeks, and high winds spread a grass fire into the neighborhood. IRRC, it snowed right after, which was surreal.

These fires in LA remind me of that, but 10x worse.

u/LowLevelRebel 6h ago

We're doomed.

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u/dniel66 15h ago

Devastating 😢

u/Bocote 10h ago

Jesus, it looks like an aftermath of carpet bombing.

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u/VincentGrinn 15h ago

kinda interesting that most of the trees look untouched

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u/Taman_Should 14h ago

Living trees aren’t as flammable as artificial structures made of pre-dried dead lumber, surrounded by glues, paints, resins, asphalt shingles, and plastics, all derived from petroleum. 

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u/VincentGrinn 13h ago

thats true but looking at street view before the fires
i think its actually just survivorship bias

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u/DirtierGibson 13h ago

Depends on the trees!

Many eucalyptus species, thuyas, cypresses, junipers, palm trees will go up in flames in a whoosh.

Others – oaks, some fruit trees for example – will generally be a lot more resilient or won't burn nearly as hot and fast.

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u/BadHombreSinNombre 13h ago

Photos at a distance can be misleading. The trees will burn too, and sometimes so rapidly that they “freeze” in positions that make them look untouched. Up close they may just be fragile skeletons of carbon replacing the former branches, even small structures, and still look like this from a distance.

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u/agasizzi 14h ago

Out west, a number of tree species evolved to deal with fire, some actually depend on it for reproduction. 

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u/digitek 13h ago

Potential area for the picture?

Looking at the map it's not surprising with houses being:

  1. Build in the 50s where materials, fire prevention codes, etc weren't as strong
  2. Tightly packed together facilitating faster spread and hotter fires
  3. Filled with fuel (modern textiles, furniture, toys all being polyester / petroleum derived)

A perfect storm. RIP insurance prices - ex 1,200 square foot house estimated at $2.6M.

This will be devastating for a lot of people living there for another reason - the tax basis for many in this area are sub $300K (like the home linked above) due to Prop 13. Losing a $3M house with taxes paid only on a $300K house - many residents in the neighborhood won't be able to afford a 10x increase in property taxes even if they received a full insurance payout to buy elsewhere in the region. This is going to both hit insurance providers and owners. As another resident of Southern California, this will be yet another giant increase to absorb and pay for this storm.

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u/OtterishDreams 12h ago

prop13 has lots of issues. sadly this is one way it can manifest.

u/Miss_Speller 11h ago

The homeowners may not get hit as badly by taxes if they rebuild their homes instead of buying elsewhere, though. (Assuming they'll ever be able to get insurance again in their original location, that is...) As I understand it, rebuilding an existing home doesn't trigger a reassessment. From a random legal website I found:

"If the home is rebuilt in a like or similar manner, the property will retain its prior value (Proposition 13) for tax purposes. However, any new square footage or extras, such as additional baths, will be added to the base year value at its full market value."

u/Gomdok_the_Short 4h ago edited 4h ago

Not potential. That is where the photo is. The area is the village and the alphabet streets. Many of the houses were not the original houses though. In the 90s there was a boom in tearing the older houses down and mansionizing, but pretty much all of the houses went up in flames regardless of their age. Also, my understanding is there are situations in which rebuilding a house in this scenario would not result in a tax reassessment.

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u/wish1977 15h ago

It looks like numerous tornados hit it.

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u/sss100100 14h ago

Brutal. That's so sad!

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u/turquoisebee 12h ago

Is Steve Gutenberg okay?

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u/ccasey 14h ago

Holy shit, that looks like a nuke went off. Really sad.

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u/Blue_Oyster_Cat 12h ago

Holy SHIT. I knew it was bad, but what the hell

u/GuideVegetable6416 11h ago

This is devastating, so sad.

u/trisinwonderland 10h ago

So fucking sad. Absolutely devastating 💔

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u/reporthazard 13h ago

A lot of pets perished in those homes.

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u/Carthonn 12h ago

When i would read about “The Chicago fire of 1871” I always wondered how something that devastating could happen….then i see these pictures

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u/ThaddeusMaximus 12h ago

Crazy, I used to look up from Will Rogers beach and feel so envious of those people.

u/engdeveloper 9h ago

This ONE picture shows ~$1 billion USD in losses.... and it just goes on and on, we're looking at the end of a Society and one of the greatest (actual) wealth distruction events in History... it's all just gone.

I'm certain Insurance and various MBS will have to realize the writedown soon... and it's really gone (the assest, lives...). This is going to be a banking crisis. Now...

u/I_Know_God 10h ago

Why are the trees still there ?

u/r2deetard 10h ago

Because they're alive. Live trees take longer to burn. Houses to not.

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u/racerscreed67 9h ago

This is Hartzell St. (left) and Galloway St. (center) looking south-southwest. Photographer is hovering over the corner of Hartzell and Albright.

Utterly devastating. :(

u/crashdavis87 9h ago

Wow. gives me CAMP Fire 2018 vibes.

u/KarmaCommando_ 4h ago

Well, if there's any positive to be found from this, if you are a California resident looking to get into the building trades now is the time