Aussie in LA fires - Sophie Lovejoy - 13th January 2024
Yes, and went through until nine o'clock this morning and for the rest of the week. David and Will they are going to be back from Monday next week, so looking forward to that. It is twenty minutes to nine o'clock, Jade. One of the big stories we've been covering all morning, and it's sadly been a story for the last week or so, the fires that are happening in LA. They have been horrific and the pictures have been extraordinary from what we've been seeing, and the damage is so widespread.
Absolutely, Tom and unfortunately sixteen people have lost their lives. We're talking hundreds of thousands of people that have been told to stay away from their homes. Unfortunately, there's been looters that are taking advantage, you know, of the homes that have been burnt down. The National Guard has been sent in. It's a tragic story that continues to unfold and a lot of the fires are still remaining uncontrolled right now. Sophie Lovejoy is in West Los Angeles, California. She's from Adelaide, a maid of mine who's been living over in LA for some time now. So thanks so much for joining us. You've been on the ground now for several days, joining the community to help. I mean, it's just it beggars belief that here we are talking about these uncontrollable fires a week later.
Oh, hi, Jane, thank you for having me. Yeah, I mean it is it is hard to fathom. And right now everyone here is absolutely exhausted, and there are still so many unknowns with the winds picking up this afternoon and over the next few days. And you know, these are kind of forty five mile an hour winds, kind of anywhere between like sixty five to eighty k's an hour, which is a solid stamper and a wizz, and you know that it just puts everyone under so much pressure to just keep trying to stay strong with all of this.
As a resident, what's it like over there? I mean, you've a lot of your friends have lost their homes. Where are they going?
Yeah, it is so hard. I've got many friends who have lost homes, businesses right now. I've got loads of friends in the Bridgewood area who have evacuated. And they even evacuated last week. They were told that they could come home and then they had to evacuate about thirty minutes later. Again, a lot of them have gone to hotel to friends. I actually escaped myself yesterday and went up to Santa Barbara and I was at a friend's house that there were a couple of families of evacuees up there. I mean, they're just sort of going anywhere that they possibly can, plus loads of evacuation centers which are completely filled to the groom at the moment, and a.
Lot of people are telling a lot of residents if they can to get out of La because the air quality is really quite poor.
Yeah, it's terrible. Why. I was back in La this morning and I took my dog for a walk and I could not believe how many people were walking around with no masks. I heard from a good friend of mine last night who's a nurse that seed the Sinai and she actually had to evacuate a couple of days ago with her family, and she said, the air quality is no joke. It is so bad. And what they're so worried about as the ramifications that will happen in say five to ten years, and lung cancer damage, all of those sorts of things. And no one can see the toxicity in the air right now. I can certainly smell it. But yeah, it is amazing that not that many people are really taking note of what nurses and doctors are saying.
It's been incredible, Sophie. It's almost looked apocalypse, you know, some of the scenes and the images that we're getting from over here. In terms of the immediate danger, are experts hoping? I mean, you talk about those winds, and they still sound like they're a real threat. But are they hopeful that the very worst of it at least is over.
They just don't. They can't really make a call on it, yes, especially because these Santa Ana winds are so erratic and they keep changing direction. I even when I kind of had a day off from it all yesterday to try and clear my head. When I got back in the car last night and I turned on the news, they were talking about how the wind had changed again back west and so the fire was burning back on itself, which was good. It gave the firefighters a bit of a reprieve. But now it's heading east again, and that spreads into that Brentwood area where there are just so many homes, and then you know, from there, you guys have probably heard of the UCLA, the big university over here, that now that sunspread as well, and if it keeps moving east, it's that's very very concerning.
You mentioned when we were talking off air about you know, we saw all those homes along Malibu that those beach homes just were you know, burnt to the ground, albeit you know, a scatter of one or two. Talk to me about the privilege of these fires. There's some people that can actually is this right, that have paid for almost their private firefighters.
Yeah, this is this is true, and it's crazy. I met a guy yesterday up in Santa Barbara and he had escaped, but his house is perfectly fine apart from smoke damage, because he is able to pay for his own, uh, private fire fighters. And the same thing happened with Rick Caruso. He's a businessman over here who he actually ran for mayor against Karen Bass and did not win. He owns the Palisades Village. He also owns the Grove and Americana for ltzens who are familiar with La and those shopping malls, and the Palisades Village is intact because he was able to send his own private crew in there with retardant and their own source of water. So you know, hearing suddenly. Hearing that yesterday, it did make my heart sink for all of the thousands of people who do not have that privilege.
It's hard to think about the rebuild, soph I mean, there's a lot of people out there that would have been to LA. When you're walking around, I mean, what are some of the landmarks that stand no longer?
Well, there's very There was a very famous actor in Los Angeles a very long time ago called Will Rogers, and uh there's the Will Rogers State Park where they had the big big polo match during the year, and and they have a lot of events out there. There are lots of middle parks and beaches in his name. And the Will Rogers House has survived so many fires through throughout the decades, and his house did not survive this one. The only thing remaining was the brick chimney, So that was that was devastating. The Getty Museum, Getty Villa is still okay, and you know that's certainly as these fires movies, it's something that has been on the news a lot. They extremely concerned about about the Getty very much right in amongst.
It, and Sophie Jay talked about it as she was welcoming you in. But issues of looting and you know other effects with you know, people now being displaced and unfortunately others taking advantage of the situation. Is that a major issue over there at the moment now too, Yeah.
It really is. And you know there are stories of people actually wearing firefighting outfits FedEx outfits and that's how they're getting to homes. And an official actually gave the press conference before and he was out in the palisades and he saw someone sitting down in a firefighting outfit and he went over to see if he was okay, and he then discovered that he was in handcuffs and he was a looter and the police had arrested him. So, yeah, it is crazy. Even one of the guys was with yesterday showed us footage of a looter coming down the back alley of his house in Brentville with gloves and a bag. This is from the ring camera and then the police came by about ten minutes after. So that's certainly the police officers are right onto it. The National Guard is in as Jade mentioned before, but you know there are several out there and these sort of disaster bring the best and the worst out in humanity.
I guess that is disgusting, isn't it. But when you say the best and the worst, you are hearing incredible rally of the community and people digging deep and you know, bringing food and shelter. I mean, what's that side of it?
Like?
Oh, that side is incredible. And Los Angeles is such an enormous city and it's been so heartwarming to see how so many people have come together for the greater good. Donation centers are overwhelmed in the best possible way, just about entering restaurants out there that can possibly do it, that have the resources to do it. Offering free meals to the firefighters, to evacuees. Yeah, there are just so many different initiative. But I heard yesterday was that Napchat so a bunch of schools have burnt down, especially in the Palisade. Snapchat are going to offer up their office for one of the schools to be able to use it. Which, Yeah, there are just so many incredible stories that are popping up like that.
What's the day to day of LA. I know we're only six days old, but I mean schools are still open, you know, people have still got to go to work. Has that almost stopped people in a sense of shock and all focuses on the fires, or is there a sense of some part of the city is continuing as normal?
You know, I think certainly restaurants and I guess insistants that are providing a service that will actually help the firefighters and the evacuees. That's certainly almost running on overtime right now. But as an example, I lived quite close to Verdeo Drive and Beverly and it's gone street. The shops there have just closed and have for the past few days. A lot of people around there, a lot of the employees are scared of the smoke as well. So yes, certainly, I think it's been very hard for people to even concentrate, to even have the you know, the strength to go off to work and concentrate on work when everyone's got rolling coverage on their TV the whole time.
And Sophie, how long have you lived over there?
For almost twelve years? Wow?
So okay, so yeah, obviously the worst thing you've seen in your time there will look stay safe. Thank you so much for being so generous with your time this morning, and hopefully we have seen the worst of it, and I guess you know, we can start the recovery process, but it sounds like this is going to be your major story for some time to come.
Absolutely, yes, thank you guys for having me on the sporting Thanks.
So stay safe. It just wouldn't feel right, would it to go to work and continue. I mean, you just do everything you can to go and help the community. Open your home. I know AIRB and b's are basically all booked out because those owners have opened their doors and you've got multiple families living in homes. I mean you just think of the rebuild. I mean we're talking about we look at the Adelaide Hills over there, so many homes are built on cliff tops along the beach like this is. These homes take five years to build. I mean, this is this is a long.
Long recovery and I think it's a proximity. Someone said it was a similar to the size of this city of Sydney. So it is a huge area that is going to need, as you say, massive rebuilds.
So now the Palisades fire, that's the one that's remaining now twenty three thousand acres of burning.
Wow, I mean it's just enormous, isn't it. It's a huge operation to try and contain those fires. We'll stay across that story, i'm sure, not just today, but throughout the week and weeks ahead.