January 7, 2025 • 33 mins
James Brotherton, NWS- L.A. Warning Coordination Meteorologist Los Angeles/ Oxnard //1,262 Acres burned, multiple homes and cars destroyed // Tim Lynn, former KTLA helicoper pilot and Sheriff on fire / President Biden will return to DC // Fire Coverage CoTim Lynn, continued coverage – 10K homes threatened, dozens of structures lost
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
It's kf I Am sixty and you're listening to the
Conway Show on demand on the iHeartRadio app.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
It is the Conway Show.
Speaker 3 (00:09):
Mark Thompson is here, and Petro stopped by to say, hey,
he's gonna be on tonight and tonight from two to three.
I'm gonna be on midnight to three. H'll come in
two to three, okay, and be on the air and
talk about the fires. Here, we have a James Brotherton.
He is a he's a national coordinator for meteorologists with
(00:33):
the National Weather Service in Los Angeles and Oxnard, and
he is with us.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
James, I know.
Speaker 3 (00:39):
It's very busy for you, really appreciate takes some time
to explain what's going on here.
Speaker 4 (00:45):
Yes, hello, Tim, pleasure to be here. We have right
now on folding more damaging wins possible tonight across the
Los Angeles region. We have a high wind warning for
the entire region. We are looking at potentially destructive winds
developing this evening, especially late this evening and overnight as
(01:10):
that Santa Ana really peaks. So we want all residents
to be alert. That includes in the Burbank area, in
most of the Los Angeles region, so this is a
destructive winds forecast tonight over fifty miles per hour, so
we could see some more problems due to this severe
(01:30):
weather condition overnight.
Speaker 5 (01:32):
James's Mark Thompson. I just want to ask you about
the humidities as well, because that's another component here. It's
so very dry and I guess getting drier.
Speaker 4 (01:41):
Yeah, we are not expecting too much relief in the
relative humidity overnight, and then tomorrow we'll see relative humidity
drop down into the single digits once again. So even
though those winds will be not as severe tomorrow, we
will still have very very low relative humid conditions. Also
(02:01):
coupled with very dry fuels in the region, this is
so far one of the driest wet seasons ever on
record in the Los Angeles area.
Speaker 3 (02:13):
You know, I'm just watching We're talking to James Brotherton here.
I'm just watching this Gelson's and Pacific Palisades. It looks
like it is midnight there with all the smoke and
the fire. Right off of Sunset Boulevard there there's a Chevron,
I think a Chevron gas station there. They're watering that down.
That's where the fire has gotten to near downtown Pacific Palisades.
Speaker 2 (02:34):
So, James, you said.
Speaker 3 (02:36):
Wins tonight and we had earlier on we had Rick
diggerd on and he said between ten pm and ten
am tomorrow is going to be the horrible witching hour,
and then he narrowed it down from midnight to six am.
Is that what you're seeing as well?
Speaker 4 (02:53):
That's pretty accurate. I would even bump that a little earlier,
possibly as early as about eight We expect winds over
fifty miles per hour Right now, I'm looking at Pasadena
hourly forecast with winds around seventy miles per hour between
(03:14):
about midnight and three am. And that goes for most
of the especially the North Hollywood San Fernando Valley all
the way over Forts Pasadena. Those destructive winds. Anytime the
winds are over about fifty miles per hour, we start
to see wind damage, especially trees and power lines. And
(03:38):
that's especially in areas that are not so likely to
see that normally. So up in the mountains, you know,
the winds tend to be stronger, but in the city
we don't see those severe winds so often, so we
tend to see more damage due to that.
Speaker 3 (03:57):
You know what, James, if you don't mind, because we
have such a vast audience here in southern California, can
you really quickly give us an Inland Empire read on
when the strong winds are coming in for Fontana, Riverside,
San Bernardino, that whole valley.
Speaker 4 (04:14):
Sure, yeah, I could definitely do that for you. Let's
see here for the Inland Empire area. Of course, that
is part of the Inland Empires covered by our San
Diego office, but I can just tell you what the
forecast is there. It does look like the winds peak
(04:35):
late to night into tomorrow morning around fifty miles per
hour in the Riverside area, stronger up towards Ontario, where
we do tend to get the downslope being sant Ana
wins more severely.
Speaker 2 (04:49):
And I noticed that again.
Speaker 3 (04:51):
I was born and raised here in the San Fernando Valley,
so of a valley bumpkin from the flats. Whenever we
had sant Ana winds in the you know, the five
decades I've been buzzing around, it really cleared the skies up.
But now there's a lot of there's a lot of
either dust or sand or particulars. I don't know what's
in the air, but it doesn't seem clear where is
(05:13):
that debris coming from.
Speaker 4 (05:14):
Is that.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
Dust from the from the desert that's blowing into the valleys.
Speaker 4 (05:20):
That is most likely local particles being picked up in
the dry soil. So since the soil is so dry
and there's already debris around, it's pretty easy to pick
that up. And and that does reduce our air quality
and visibility. As you're noticing there, I'm seeing those feeds
(05:42):
that you're seeing as well, very dark conditions in the
fire area especially.
Speaker 3 (05:47):
And real quickly, give us an Orange County for people
live in Orange County, Give us a time, give us
a window there is it still midnight to five am
for Orange County as well?
Speaker 4 (05:58):
Let me see here for Orange County that still looks
like tonight in't early tomorrow morning as well? They're going
to look here. Peak wins for Orange County looks like
about ten pm through seven am. And just a disclaimer,
I work for the Los Angeles office, so I am
(06:19):
referencing the forecast from our friends down in San Diego.
They do cover Orange County. But yeah, that does look
to be the time highest wins about ten pm to
seven am in the Orange County area.
Speaker 3 (06:32):
All right, James, I really appreciate you coming on with us.
I know we're going to talk to you again, and
I know it's very busy. Thanks for taking the time
out to explain this to everybody.
Speaker 4 (06:41):
Absolutely, thank you for helping us get the word out.
Speaker 2 (06:44):
You got it, James Bretherdon.
Speaker 3 (06:45):
He is the coordinating meteorologist for NOAH and the National
Weather Service here in Los Angeles and in Oxnard, and
we I'm looking at the Gelson's right now. There's a
seventy six station right there. Guy with a mask on,
gas mask on, and he's hosing down the seventy six
gas station. And that fire is across the street.
Speaker 6 (07:09):
Yeah, that's the village. That's Palisage Village.
Speaker 3 (07:12):
If that village burns down and these gas stations catch
on fire, I can't imagine the damage that's going to
go on that fire. Mark it's across the street. Yeah,
across the street from Gelson's, across sunset. That's how close
the fire has gotten.
Speaker 5 (07:26):
As you say, it's hosing down the surface of the
street and what's essentially a surfaced area around the gas station.
Of course those tanks are underground, but you're right, it
represents an insanely dangerous situation.
Speaker 2 (07:40):
Who's the young lady out there for Fox? Who's doing
that real?
Speaker 6 (07:43):
Well, that's Christie Fajardo, baby.
Speaker 3 (07:45):
Okay man, she braves sitting out there. That fire is
across the street from a gas station. There's a gas
station across the street as well, on the other side
of the street. And she's sitting there doing a live report.
That's incredible, That is unbelievable. All right, we're going to
be covering this all all night long. I'll give you
the schedule again, and we're not We're not going anywhere.
We're staying with you all night and all day tomorrow.
(08:09):
I'll be here till seven o'clock with Mark Thompson. Moke
Kelly's coming in from seven pm until midnight. I'll come
back at midnight till three am, two to three with Petros,
two am to three am with Petros, and then at
three am Neil Savedra will come in. And then after
a deal is done five o'clock or six o'clock, not
(08:29):
sure yet, then you're gonna have Bill Handle and then
it'll go Bill Handle, Gary and Shannon, and then it'll
continue with John Colebel. I always still call the John Kensham.
Speaker 5 (08:42):
Yeah, that's all right. Time. It hasn't even been oh
I guess it has been a little.
Speaker 6 (08:46):
A little over here.
Speaker 2 (08:47):
Yeah, December of last year.
Speaker 3 (08:49):
All right, we're live on KFI AM six forty covering
all of the huge wind event here, the fire burning
and Palisades, and we'll get an update on the on
the fire burning out of Santa Clarita east of Cast Steak,
the Gulch fire as well. We're gonna we're going to
get through this. It's just going to be a big
headache until we do. It's going to be a long night.
Speaker 4 (09:10):
Man.
Speaker 3 (09:10):
These winds are going to pick up tonight between eight
pm and ten am tomorrow.
Speaker 2 (09:16):
It's going to crazy crazy, So keep it on KFI.
Speaker 7 (09:20):
You're listening to Tim Conway Junior on demand from KFI
AM six forty.
Speaker 3 (09:26):
Whatever shot that is that looks like that's right next
to Pch and it looks like a home at very
expensive home or an office or something burned down.
Speaker 2 (09:33):
A lot of American flags outside there, and then it's.
Speaker 5 (09:36):
All that's left and it is just a you know right,
I mean that the entire structure's gutting.
Speaker 3 (09:42):
We're looking at the Palisades fire. They're calling it the
Pacific Palisades Fire. It's I don't know what the what
the answer to this is. But whatever they're doing right
now is not working, and these embers are flying everywhere.
It's dark because the electricity has been shut off the area,
so there's no street lights. The only light you get
(10:04):
there from the glow of the fire. The palm trees
are burning. When the palm trees burn, they send out
sparks for hours after they catch fire, other homes catch fire.
When do you think it's over for the palm trees,
especially the big you know, what do they call it?
Is it the the Mexican palm tree? I heard that term,
(10:25):
the Southern palm tree, the big, huge one with the
big fronds.
Speaker 2 (10:30):
It's got and soon? Was that the queens the queens palm?
Speaker 3 (10:34):
Yes, the queens, look at you, it's got it. It's
got to be over for that plant soon, meaning you
want to see it removed.
Speaker 2 (10:41):
Take them all down.
Speaker 3 (10:42):
Yeah, Yeah, we've we've had enough, had enough because they
spark for hours hours, it's and all the firefighters know it.
But the problem is, again it's a symbol of Southern California.
Those palm trees. You know, you grew up in Washington,
d C. When you saw the palm trees, you owe
that Southern calif of course. Yeah, they're at every in
and out, you know, that's the symbol of in and
(11:04):
out is the palm tree.
Speaker 2 (11:06):
But they're just not on fire.
Speaker 6 (11:08):
You know.
Speaker 3 (11:09):
These are the ones that are on fire. Present a
huge problem, huge problem. We're gonna try to get Tim
Lynn on to talk about the temporary flight restriction. I
think I misspoke earlier. There are helicopters up there fighting
the fire. There are no news helicopters up there though,
because of the flight restriction and President Biden's in town.
(11:30):
If President Biden wasn't in town, you would see Channel two,
four or five, seven, nine eleven all have helicopters up
there fighting the wind to bring us pictures of what's
going on.
Speaker 2 (11:40):
And now they're all the same.
Speaker 3 (11:41):
That's all from the road and a lot of the
times reporters can't get closed because they're there, you know,
in the way of people evacuating. And so this is
how it used to look in the nineteen seventies when
I was watching TV.
Speaker 2 (11:54):
You know, there were no.
Speaker 3 (11:55):
Helicopters there a very few helicopters up there, and we've
gone back to that, but Mark, that's PCH there. So
they're they're in the parking lot of the beach there
and they're looking at the homes right across the street.
Speaker 5 (12:08):
And people in Malibu will tell you, I mean, and
you only have to drive that same stretch and you
can see entire areas that Malibu Hills charred from past fires.
This is an area that constantly faces a threat from
just what we're seeing now. This particular wind event exceeds
anything we've seen since, as you were saying, twenty eleven,
(12:31):
probably in terms of sustained wind velocity, low humidities, the
kind of fire danger that we're seeing continued, and of
course these fires themselves are so widespread that there's really
just nothing in recent memory anyway that measures up.
Speaker 3 (12:45):
And we've not even seen the worst of it that's
coming tonight. Between eight pm tonight, two and a half
hours from now and ten am tomorrow morning, that's when
you're going to see, you know, the unbelievable winds. Fremont
came eighty mile an hours arrowhead spring seventy seven miles
an hour running spring seventy four miles an hour and
(13:06):
is at Lytle Creek seventy miles an hour. These are gus,
you know earlier gus Fremont Canyon eighty miles an hour.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
That's hurricane. Is that category one?
Speaker 6 (13:19):
Yeah, exactly. I think about seventy four would be.
Speaker 2 (13:21):
Is that right?
Speaker 6 (13:22):
Right?
Speaker 3 (13:23):
So, I mean, look, we don't live in a hurricane area,
and these winds aren't sustained over you know, four hours
of eighty miles an hour.
Speaker 2 (13:30):
These are gus.
Speaker 3 (13:31):
But still you get a feel for what it might
be like to be in a hurricane when you know,
when these winds hit. There are hundreds of cars that
have been pushed to the side going up to the
highlands in Pacific Palisades and as a fire hydrant that
broke earlier, which presents a huge problem. Cars slammed into
(13:53):
a fire hydrant and they had to shut that thing off.
And it's just it seems like the world is ending
for a lot of people out there.
Speaker 5 (14:00):
Yeah, I mean, in a sense it is. I mean
the landscape is going to change forever. Yeah, it's going
to change semi permanently. You can build back, but it's
going to be different. And they've got to get those
assets up that road, which is why they pushed all
those cars off to the side.
Speaker 3 (14:16):
And you know, when you know next week, next Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, whatever,
there's going to be a whole host of people raising
hell that their car was totaled by the fire department,
and the fire department is going to say we need
to get up to the mountain to save your homes.
And the guy in the car will say I was
told to get out of this car by a cop.
Speaker 2 (14:37):
And there's going to be a lot of lawsuits going on.
Speaker 5 (14:39):
Yeah, I mean, I think a lot of that's going
to happen with the insurance companies, et cetera dealing with it.
But you're right, I mean, the important thing is that
you get you know, pets.
Speaker 6 (14:48):
And people out of there right. Then you deal with.
Speaker 5 (14:53):
Belongings and structures and automobiles. But as long as people
can get out of there safely, that's the priority.
Speaker 3 (15:00):
It is odd to see the bulldozers take these Maseratis
or Mercedes or high end Tesla's and push them out
of the way like they're toy cars. And to watch
that is a little disconcerting. It's it's like, you know,
we know people that that you know that may be
you know, David Howard may have been one of his
(15:21):
cars or buddy that lives up in you know, in
the Highlands up there, and this is not over. I
hope everybody in the Highlands is out by now. I
can't imagine anybody is still there, but maybe they are,
you know, because this fire happened at ten thirty in
the morning. You know, we're still getting back into the
swing of things from New Year's and Christmas and the holidays,
(15:45):
and people may have taken you know, this week off,
or at least, you know, the first couple of days
of this week off, coming back from vacation. There's a
buddy of mine who lives up there, and he's in Mexico.
He has to watch this on TV on his cell
phone from Mexico, and he's just beside himself that he
has a beautiful home up there and it could be
(16:05):
gone by the time he gets back from Mexico. It's
a big deal.
Speaker 5 (16:09):
Ten thousand homes threaten, more than thirty thousand under evacuation orders.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
Okay, we're gonna come back. It's gonna do.
Speaker 3 (16:15):
We'll come back with the raw numbers of this fire
acreage homes, cars, and I tell you what's going on,
and also give you an update on the one acre
fire in Santa Clarita east of Cast Steak, the Gulch fire,
see if they have put that out.
Speaker 2 (16:29):
Hopefully they have.
Speaker 3 (16:30):
It's gonna be a long night. We're gonna be covering
it all night. Moe Kelly will be here seven to midnight.
I'm coming back midnight to three am. Neil Svader from
three am till Handle either five am or six am,
and then it starts all over again tomorrow, Bill Handle, Gary, Shannon,
John and then us again at four pm tomorrow. Do
not change the station. You're gonna need KFI tonight and
(16:53):
tomorrow and for the rest of this week to tell
you what's going on. With all the wind across all
of southern California, You're going to need this station.
Speaker 7 (17:01):
Tonight you're listening to Tim conwaytun You're on demand from
KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 3 (17:09):
We're watching this fire. This fire has reached Palisades Charter
High School property and they firefighters try to keep obviously
this fire away from schools. We know how much we
need the schools, especially recovered from something like this, and
they could not stop this fire from reaching the Palisades
(17:31):
Charter High.
Speaker 5 (17:32):
School property, the Getty Museum there, the Getty Villa, which
is there, you know that endanger apparently under the yeah.
Speaker 6 (17:42):
It is in danger.
Speaker 5 (17:43):
And again I'm seeing conflicting reports from that there's actually
fire there and that I'm seeing LAFD saying the villa
site is currently safe and they're an ongoing contact.
Speaker 3 (17:54):
So twelve hundred acres over ten thousand homes that are
being threatened. If you're watching Channel eleven or Channel two.
Channel two has a great reporter there who's got a
lot of balls right there in the middle of that fire.
Speaker 2 (18:09):
She's great.
Speaker 3 (18:10):
But Channel eleven has had this shot all night long
that looks like hell. It looks like just all of
La is burning, and these fires are going to get
hit with win tonight that'll be stronger than anything we've
had in the last twenty four hours. So from eight
pm in about two hours and twenty minutes till about
(18:35):
ten am tomorrow will be stronger wins than we've had
all day long.
Speaker 6 (18:40):
All right.
Speaker 3 (18:41):
Tim Lynn is with us. He used to fly for KTLA.
He still does some work for the Orange County Sheriff's Department.
And he's going to explain to us why we don't
have any footage from news copters over this fire like
we should.
Speaker 2 (18:54):
Tim Lynn, welcome to KF five.
Speaker 8 (18:57):
Hey, Jimmy, how are you doing?
Speaker 3 (18:58):
Buddy Goodson's with us as well.
Speaker 2 (19:02):
What do you know?
Speaker 3 (19:03):
And why have these news agencies not contacted the Secret
Service to say, hey, give us a break and let
us fly over these fires.
Speaker 8 (19:13):
Well, on the list of priorities the News Service in
the Secret Service world is probably way down to the bottom,
so not much is going to happen. We've tried many
times back in the data, get it from get information
from them to be able to go and go to
an area just outside of THETFR, and they're very reluctant
to let them fly. And the reason is is because
(19:34):
they don't know who is flying that helicopter. You have
not been vetted by the Secret Service, and unless they
know who you are, they don't want you anywhere near
their restricted space. So the reason they can't fly tonight
is because a thirty mile vail around Lax extends well
over the fire area.
Speaker 3 (19:52):
And when does that expire? Do we know tomorrow morning
or tomorrow day time? Sometime?
Speaker 8 (19:57):
Yeah, tomorrow morning. I think the last time I looked
it was about nine o'clock is when it's going to
be lifted.
Speaker 3 (20:03):
So if President Biden leaves at nine at nine oh one,
is it lifted.
Speaker 8 (20:08):
No, it goes for thirty minutes after heat a parts,
so that gives him time to get up and out
of the airspace.
Speaker 2 (20:14):
And it's thirty miles from wherever he is.
Speaker 8 (20:18):
Well, the there's a veil of thirty miles from lax.
Now that's the no fly zone you have. You cannot
fly in that area. But wherever the president is that
they have a sometimes a ten eleven or twelve mile
circle to which no one can fly in. You're absolutely
not allowed to fly there. Fortunately, none of those circles
(20:40):
are up over the fire air but I guarantee you
they would amend that in a hurry. But even police
cannot fly in the ten mile or eleven mile circle
unless they're in direct support of the Secret Service.
Speaker 3 (20:53):
And then what about also, you know we have the
do noton fly zone, the temporary flight restriction that covers
the president. But aren't there also a couple of F
eighteens that are about ten twelve thousand feet in the
air right now?
Speaker 8 (21:09):
Right, they're up there probably you know, eighteen thousand feet.
They call it the Combat Air Patrol, and they're up
there the whole time the President is away from the
White House, and just to make sure that they have
air support in case somebody does make a threatening move
towards the president. So should they aircraft stray into the area,
(21:29):
get into that thirty mile area, they will start inquiring.
They'll send helicopters up, they'll send the jets down and
try to identify that aircraft to give them time to
do whatever they need to do to protect the president.
But yeah, they're very serious about it, and they do
different things to get your attention by flying really close
to you, flying in front of you. And they also
(21:53):
even in the restriction you can read that it says
the even authorized to use deadly force if necessary.
Speaker 2 (21:59):
And they're not and they're willing to do that absolutely.
Speaker 8 (22:03):
That's their job. I mean, if they get the clearance
to do it. But a F eighteen flying by Assessa,
you know, they can fly by and tear the wings
off Assessma without even touching. It would just with awake turbulence.
Speaker 3 (22:14):
All right, Tim, hold on one second, Tim Lenni is
with us. He used to fly for KTLA. We'll put
him on hold and ask him some more questions. He's
flown over a ton of these fires. He can give
us a first a first hand idea of what this
is like, especially flying helicopter in this kind of win.
Speaker 6 (22:30):
This just in.
Speaker 3 (22:31):
President Biden first Lady Jill Biden are headed to downtown
Los Angeles a Los Angeles hotel tonight as a result
of the Pacific Palisades Fire. Biden was in a motorcade
vehicle in West Los Angeles Santa Monica area this morning
for a planned trip to Thermal, which is outside of
Joshua Tree, when officials made the decision to return to
(22:53):
the hotel. A court to the White House. Air Force
one is now expected to leave for Washington early tomorrow
after after noon. So when the strongest winds hit tonight
into tomorrow morning, we're not going to get any coverage
from any news agency until at least early afternoon tomorrow.
Speaker 5 (23:11):
Well you'll get coverage, you just won't get the chopper stuff.
You're talking, right, We're not going to get help, that's right. Yeah,
did I miss speak? Just a We're not going to
get any coverage helicopter coverage.
Speaker 2 (23:22):
Yes, okay, sorry, thank you, thank god you're here.
Speaker 8 (23:24):
Mark.
Speaker 6 (23:26):
Well, you know it takes a lot for me to
correct you.
Speaker 2 (23:28):
I see, I see, all right.
Speaker 3 (23:29):
Okay, so helicopter footage, We're not going to get any
helicopter footage from the news agencies. They're helicopters will be grounded.
Speaker 6 (23:37):
Yeah, any air until tomorrow. Tomorrow. Okay.
Speaker 3 (23:39):
We'll come back and talk to Tim Lynn, who also
flew helicopter and still does and we'll get an idea
of what it's like for these firefighters as well, who
are fighting these fires from the air. We'll ask him
what air assets they can use at night? Can they
use the fixed wing? Can they use the helicopters? This
is going to be a long night for people to
live in southern Californi, especially people live in Pacific Palisades.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
This is a nightmare.
Speaker 5 (24:04):
I'm also curious, Tim, I want to ask when we
come back, what velocity is the threshold after which they
can't fly.
Speaker 6 (24:10):
In those great questions, really really intense wednes tonight.
Speaker 7 (24:13):
Yes, you're listening to Tim Conway Junior on demand from
KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 2 (24:20):
Mark Thompson's here.
Speaker 3 (24:22):
Well, that's not the reason that's finishing. No, it's one though.
But we're watching this fire here in the Palisades.
Speaker 2 (24:28):
It has burned.
Speaker 3 (24:30):
There are ten thousand homes that are threatened, ten thousand homes.
It has reached the Charter High School. We don't know
the extent of the damage there. Thirty thousand people have
been told to evacuate. This fire has gotten down to
and if you're familiar with the town of Palisades, of
(24:51):
Pacific Issades, where Gelson's is, there are trees in the
Gelson's parking lot that are on fire. Trees in the
Gelson's parking lot on fire. Gas station. Next door is
the seventy six station. They're trying to water that down.
God help us if that blows all right, Tim Lynn
is with us. He flew helicopters for Channel five for
(25:13):
quite some time also the Orange County Sheriff's Department. Tim
Mark Thompson had a great question, at what wind velocity
are you grounded when it comes to flying a news helicopter.
Speaker 8 (25:29):
Well, most news helicopters are the a Star or the
Eurocopter helicopters. Now they're now called Airbus and they have
limitations just for starting In the book and so it's
forty miles an hour any direction around the aircraft, or
fifty miles an hour on the nose just to start it.
(25:49):
And that's because the malaise will flex and hit the
tail and you make the problems for you. Yeah, but
in flight, there's no posted restriction. The only thing that'll
happen is that the controls are handled by hydraulic servos,
and if you overload those servos because of turbulence, you're
getting moved and you're moving against the turbulence. It'll do
(26:12):
a thing called servo transparency where it locks up and
it's like losing your power steering and it goes for
just a couple of seconds and let's go it. That
is your indication that you've you've overstepped your bounds and
you need to get on the ground because you know
the aircraft can take a lot, but when you start
getting into that area with an a star especially, that's
(26:33):
when you need to go find find an airport to
land at and wait it out. But now every aircraft
has a different different category. Now that firehawks, the Fire
Department flies, I'm not sure what their categories are, but
I can tell you wins like this It is no picnic.
It is a rough ride.
Speaker 5 (26:50):
But it's likely that their thresholder is higher, is what
you're kind of implying right than the news choppers.
Speaker 8 (26:57):
It could it actually could be lower because of their
way and because of their load they're carrying than two.
They have policy and procedures written in the County Fire
and the City Fire setting down guidelines for win speed,
So they each department will set a guideline outside of
what the aircraft manufacturer has. They will go by their
(27:18):
policy and procedure of their department, and they may have
a win limitation in that policy and procedure, just to
give that big block area of safety to where you know,
we're going to be a little bit safer what the
book says, and make it just a little bit higher,
just to protect our employees.
Speaker 3 (27:37):
Tim Lens with its tim When these they're fighting fires
all night long here and we're expecting the most ferocious
winds of this event to come in in about two
hours from now, all the way till ten am. Is
it easier or harder to fight these fires at night?
And I only think it might be easier because you
(27:57):
can see the hotspots at night.
Speaker 2 (27:58):
Is it tougher or are easier to fight at night.
Speaker 8 (28:02):
Well, you have to realize the pilot will be on
night vision and the problem with that is night vision
uh can get blanked out by the light from the fire.
It doesn't you can't really see the fire, uh that clearly.
You can see the fire clearly, but it's really bright
in an NDG environment, and so to be able to
clear that black terrain that's on either side of the fire,
(28:26):
you have to have those on so you can't look
directly at the fire. And then you you you very
row can't see wires, and you have to be really
careful of that because they're real hard to see at
night and getting in those canyons and down low and
things like that. It's a lot easier to fight during
the day where you can see all the terrain and
hazards as you're coming in, but when you're on goggles
(28:47):
you have to worry about the uh what a wash
out type thing. If you get in looking at the
fire too too big and it's too bright, it tends
to you know, blow them out a little bit where
you have to look away. So, yeah, it's a little
bit harder at night, especially now you don't have good
terrain or good situational awareness because you've taken away one
(29:07):
of your abilities to judge a distance.
Speaker 3 (29:09):
You know, these news helicopters, a lot of them have
what look like giant swords on the front. There's one
on the top and one on the bottom, and those
are to cut power wires in case they hit them.
I guess do they have those on the firefighting helicopters
as well.
Speaker 8 (29:25):
Absolutely? Yeah, So those are on there and they do
help quite a bit. I mean, if you go through
a wire, and unless you're going slow, speed is your
friend if you hit a wire with the wirecutters, because
they don't work very well if you're at a low
rate of speed. So, but you still have to worry
about that wire wrapping around something after it snaps, so
you don't want to hit them.
Speaker 2 (29:46):
Yeah, that's not a great idea.
Speaker 3 (29:48):
You know, watching these fires burn right now, and these
homes burn and there's no firefighters on these homes at all.
I'm watching three of them burn right here on Channel eleven,
and there's no firefighters at all. There's an ambulance that
is driving by, there's a couple of private vehicles that
are driving by, that's got to drive these firefighters crazy
(30:10):
and it probably depresses the hell out of them.
Speaker 8 (30:14):
I'm sure it does. You know, it's a pride thing
to be able to help protect the community they work for,
and their job is to put out the fire and
knock it down and save property and save lives. And
they start losing houses, but they have to keep the
reality of it. You have a very large fire that's
taken out many structures, and as Captain Scott was talking
(30:35):
about earlier, they kind of triage it, They look at it.
If the house is well involved, they go after the
one they can protect. And you know, and it gets
to a point to where firefighter safety becomes an issue,
to where if they can't get out in front of
that fire, especially in wind speeds like this, because it
can throw flames a long way and embers a long way.
(30:55):
As we talk all the time, it can cast those
zimbers up to two miles and that fire come up
over a hill, can roll right over the top of
you because it has sixty five miles an hour wind
behind it, and the last thing you do want to
do is get caught in front of that.
Speaker 3 (31:08):
And even when you know, when we return to normal,
and we will you know, on Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday
of next week when all the fires are out. Everyone's
back to school and everyone's back to normal. Still, the
topography of this of this community, the Pacific Palisades area,
which is spectacularly beautiful, will be changed for the next
(31:29):
five to ten years.
Speaker 8 (31:32):
Yeah, a lot longer than that. It takes a long
time for that vegetation to re establish. Flying down here
in Orange County after the big fire we had a
couple months ago, It's Santiago Peak looks like the moon.
Now it's just completely gray and burned away. A couple
of really nice, pretty green areas we used to fly
through back in there where the hiking trails and you know,
(31:52):
pick people up they got hurt. It's gone. It's just
basically gray dirt now. It's really unfortunate and really source
site to see in that area there. You know, it's
so pretty right along the beach. And also you have
all those folks that are losing everything they own.
Speaker 3 (32:07):
Yeah, Tim, you've been in the news business for a
long time. Tim Linn is with us. Do you get
a sense or have you in the past where people
are either burned out of an area by a fire
or get a close call that they they have a tendency,
especially if they have small kids, to say screw it,
we're going to the valley flats or we're going to
you know, seem Me Valley or Orange County and not
(32:29):
dealing with this headache anymore.
Speaker 8 (32:32):
I you know, I don't have any personal experience with
anybody who's to live through this. I've heard stories of it,
and you have. You know, the people up down both
sides of that line, they though it's not going to
happen again. It's all burned out. We're not having to
come through here again. Well we'll wait. You know, it's
goes like back to the folks that flood every year.
Why are you building your house back? It flooded last year.
(32:54):
It's it's all that depends on how much you're attached
to that area, and some people love of it in
the mountains. A you as simple as that, buddy.
Speaker 3 (33:02):
I appreciate you coming on. We'll talk to you to
night after midnight and coming back. And I heard you're
gonna be a guest.
Speaker 6 (33:07):
I'll be with you, Budy Bikszellen.
Speaker 2 (33:08):
Thank you, sir. All right, Tim Lynn I'm gonna go.
Speaker 3 (33:11):
We'll go to seven o'clock tonight me Mark Thompson, then
Moe Kelly comes in from seven pm till midnight. I'm
coming back at midnight till three am. Nil Savedra from
three am to five am. Amy King, who.
Speaker 2 (33:23):
I was told was uh was Ill, is now recovered.
Speaker 1 (33:29):
Conway Show on demand on the iHeart Radio app.
Speaker 2 (33:33):
Now you can
Speaker 1 (33:33):
Always hear us live on kf I Am six forty
four to seven pm Monday through Friday, and anytime on
demand on the iHeart Radio app
It's kf I Am sixty and you're listening to the
Conway Show on demand on the iHeartRadio app.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
It is the Conway Show.
Speaker 3 (00:09):
Mark Thompson is here, and Petro stopped by to say, hey,
he's gonna be on tonight and tonight from two to three.
I'm gonna be on midnight to three. H'll come in
two to three, okay, and be on the air and
talk about the fires. Here, we have a James Brotherton.
He is a he's a national coordinator for meteorologists with
(00:33):
the National Weather Service in Los Angeles and Oxnard, and
he is with us.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
James, I know.
Speaker 3 (00:39):
It's very busy for you, really appreciate takes some time
to explain what's going on here.
Speaker 4 (00:45):
Yes, hello, Tim, pleasure to be here. We have right
now on folding more damaging wins possible tonight across the
Los Angeles region. We have a high wind warning for
the entire region. We are looking at potentially destructive winds
developing this evening, especially late this evening and overnight as
(01:10):
that Santa Ana really peaks. So we want all residents
to be alert. That includes in the Burbank area, in
most of the Los Angeles region, so this is a
destructive winds forecast tonight over fifty miles per hour, so
we could see some more problems due to this severe
(01:30):
weather condition overnight.
Speaker 5 (01:32):
James's Mark Thompson. I just want to ask you about
the humidities as well, because that's another component here. It's
so very dry and I guess getting drier.
Speaker 4 (01:41):
Yeah, we are not expecting too much relief in the
relative humidity overnight, and then tomorrow we'll see relative humidity
drop down into the single digits once again. So even
though those winds will be not as severe tomorrow, we
will still have very very low relative humid conditions. Also
(02:01):
coupled with very dry fuels in the region, this is
so far one of the driest wet seasons ever on
record in the Los Angeles area.
Speaker 3 (02:13):
You know, I'm just watching We're talking to James Brotherton here.
I'm just watching this Gelson's and Pacific Palisades. It looks
like it is midnight there with all the smoke and
the fire. Right off of Sunset Boulevard there there's a Chevron,
I think a Chevron gas station there. They're watering that down.
That's where the fire has gotten to near downtown Pacific Palisades.
Speaker 2 (02:34):
So, James, you said.
Speaker 3 (02:36):
Wins tonight and we had earlier on we had Rick
diggerd on and he said between ten pm and ten
am tomorrow is going to be the horrible witching hour,
and then he narrowed it down from midnight to six am.
Is that what you're seeing as well?
Speaker 4 (02:53):
That's pretty accurate. I would even bump that a little earlier,
possibly as early as about eight We expect winds over
fifty miles per hour Right now, I'm looking at Pasadena
hourly forecast with winds around seventy miles per hour between
(03:14):
about midnight and three am. And that goes for most
of the especially the North Hollywood San Fernando Valley all
the way over Forts Pasadena. Those destructive winds. Anytime the
winds are over about fifty miles per hour, we start
to see wind damage, especially trees and power lines. And
(03:38):
that's especially in areas that are not so likely to
see that normally. So up in the mountains, you know,
the winds tend to be stronger, but in the city
we don't see those severe winds so often, so we
tend to see more damage due to that.
Speaker 3 (03:57):
You know what, James, if you don't mind, because we
have such a vast audience here in southern California, can
you really quickly give us an Inland Empire read on
when the strong winds are coming in for Fontana, Riverside,
San Bernardino, that whole valley.
Speaker 4 (04:14):
Sure, yeah, I could definitely do that for you. Let's
see here for the Inland Empire area. Of course, that
is part of the Inland Empires covered by our San
Diego office, but I can just tell you what the
forecast is there. It does look like the winds peak
(04:35):
late to night into tomorrow morning around fifty miles per
hour in the Riverside area, stronger up towards Ontario, where
we do tend to get the downslope being sant Ana
wins more severely.
Speaker 2 (04:49):
And I noticed that again.
Speaker 3 (04:51):
I was born and raised here in the San Fernando Valley,
so of a valley bumpkin from the flats. Whenever we
had sant Ana winds in the you know, the five
decades I've been buzzing around, it really cleared the skies up.
But now there's a lot of there's a lot of
either dust or sand or particulars. I don't know what's
in the air, but it doesn't seem clear where is
(05:13):
that debris coming from.
Speaker 4 (05:14):
Is that.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
Dust from the from the desert that's blowing into the valleys.
Speaker 4 (05:20):
That is most likely local particles being picked up in
the dry soil. So since the soil is so dry
and there's already debris around, it's pretty easy to pick
that up. And and that does reduce our air quality
and visibility. As you're noticing there, I'm seeing those feeds
(05:42):
that you're seeing as well, very dark conditions in the
fire area especially.
Speaker 3 (05:47):
And real quickly, give us an Orange County for people
live in Orange County, Give us a time, give us
a window there is it still midnight to five am
for Orange County as well?
Speaker 4 (05:58):
Let me see here for Orange County that still looks
like tonight in't early tomorrow morning as well? They're going
to look here. Peak wins for Orange County looks like
about ten pm through seven am. And just a disclaimer,
I work for the Los Angeles office, so I am
(06:19):
referencing the forecast from our friends down in San Diego.
They do cover Orange County. But yeah, that does look
to be the time highest wins about ten pm to
seven am in the Orange County area.
Speaker 3 (06:32):
All right, James, I really appreciate you coming on with us.
I know we're going to talk to you again, and
I know it's very busy. Thanks for taking the time
out to explain this to everybody.
Speaker 4 (06:41):
Absolutely, thank you for helping us get the word out.
Speaker 2 (06:44):
You got it, James Bretherdon.
Speaker 3 (06:45):
He is the coordinating meteorologist for NOAH and the National
Weather Service here in Los Angeles and in Oxnard, and
we I'm looking at the Gelson's right now. There's a
seventy six station right there. Guy with a mask on,
gas mask on, and he's hosing down the seventy six
gas station. And that fire is across the street.
Speaker 6 (07:09):
Yeah, that's the village. That's Palisage Village.
Speaker 3 (07:12):
If that village burns down and these gas stations catch
on fire, I can't imagine the damage that's going to
go on that fire. Mark it's across the street. Yeah,
across the street from Gelson's, across sunset. That's how close
the fire has gotten.
Speaker 5 (07:26):
As you say, it's hosing down the surface of the
street and what's essentially a surfaced area around the gas station.
Of course those tanks are underground, but you're right, it
represents an insanely dangerous situation.
Speaker 2 (07:40):
Who's the young lady out there for Fox? Who's doing
that real?
Speaker 6 (07:43):
Well, that's Christie Fajardo, baby.
Speaker 3 (07:45):
Okay man, she braves sitting out there. That fire is
across the street from a gas station. There's a gas
station across the street as well, on the other side
of the street. And she's sitting there doing a live report.
That's incredible, That is unbelievable. All right, we're going to
be covering this all all night long. I'll give you
the schedule again, and we're not We're not going anywhere.
We're staying with you all night and all day tomorrow.
(08:09):
I'll be here till seven o'clock with Mark Thompson. Moke
Kelly's coming in from seven pm until midnight. I'll come
back at midnight till three am, two to three with Petros,
two am to three am with Petros, and then at
three am Neil Savedra will come in. And then after
a deal is done five o'clock or six o'clock, not
(08:29):
sure yet, then you're gonna have Bill Handle and then
it'll go Bill Handle, Gary and Shannon, and then it'll
continue with John Colebel. I always still call the John Kensham.
Speaker 5 (08:42):
Yeah, that's all right. Time. It hasn't even been oh
I guess it has been a little.
Speaker 6 (08:46):
A little over here.
Speaker 2 (08:47):
Yeah, December of last year.
Speaker 3 (08:49):
All right, we're live on KFI AM six forty covering
all of the huge wind event here, the fire burning
and Palisades, and we'll get an update on the on
the fire burning out of Santa Clarita east of Cast Steak,
the Gulch fire as well. We're gonna we're going to
get through this. It's just going to be a big
headache until we do. It's going to be a long night.
Speaker 4 (09:10):
Man.
Speaker 3 (09:10):
These winds are going to pick up tonight between eight
pm and ten am tomorrow.
Speaker 2 (09:16):
It's going to crazy crazy, So keep it on KFI.
Speaker 7 (09:20):
You're listening to Tim Conway Junior on demand from KFI
AM six forty.
Speaker 3 (09:26):
Whatever shot that is that looks like that's right next
to Pch and it looks like a home at very
expensive home or an office or something burned down.
Speaker 2 (09:33):
A lot of American flags outside there, and then it's.
Speaker 5 (09:36):
All that's left and it is just a you know right,
I mean that the entire structure's gutting.
Speaker 3 (09:42):
We're looking at the Palisades fire. They're calling it the
Pacific Palisades Fire. It's I don't know what the what
the answer to this is. But whatever they're doing right
now is not working, and these embers are flying everywhere.
It's dark because the electricity has been shut off the area,
so there's no street lights. The only light you get
(10:04):
there from the glow of the fire. The palm trees
are burning. When the palm trees burn, they send out
sparks for hours after they catch fire, other homes catch fire.
When do you think it's over for the palm trees,
especially the big you know, what do they call it?
Is it the the Mexican palm tree? I heard that term,
(10:25):
the Southern palm tree, the big, huge one with the
big fronds.
Speaker 2 (10:30):
It's got and soon? Was that the queens the queens palm?
Speaker 3 (10:34):
Yes, the queens, look at you, it's got it. It's
got to be over for that plant soon, meaning you
want to see it removed.
Speaker 2 (10:41):
Take them all down.
Speaker 3 (10:42):
Yeah, Yeah, we've we've had enough, had enough because they
spark for hours hours, it's and all the firefighters know it.
But the problem is, again it's a symbol of Southern California.
Those palm trees. You know, you grew up in Washington,
d C. When you saw the palm trees, you owe
that Southern calif of course. Yeah, they're at every in
and out, you know, that's the symbol of in and
(11:04):
out is the palm tree.
Speaker 2 (11:06):
But they're just not on fire.
Speaker 6 (11:08):
You know.
Speaker 3 (11:09):
These are the ones that are on fire. Present a
huge problem, huge problem. We're gonna try to get Tim
Lynn on to talk about the temporary flight restriction. I
think I misspoke earlier. There are helicopters up there fighting
the fire. There are no news helicopters up there though,
because of the flight restriction and President Biden's in town.
(11:30):
If President Biden wasn't in town, you would see Channel two,
four or five, seven, nine eleven all have helicopters up
there fighting the wind to bring us pictures of what's
going on.
Speaker 2 (11:40):
And now they're all the same.
Speaker 3 (11:41):
That's all from the road and a lot of the
times reporters can't get closed because they're there, you know,
in the way of people evacuating. And so this is
how it used to look in the nineteen seventies when
I was watching TV.
Speaker 2 (11:54):
You know, there were no.
Speaker 3 (11:55):
Helicopters there a very few helicopters up there, and we've
gone back to that, but Mark, that's PCH there. So
they're they're in the parking lot of the beach there
and they're looking at the homes right across the street.
Speaker 5 (12:08):
And people in Malibu will tell you, I mean, and
you only have to drive that same stretch and you
can see entire areas that Malibu Hills charred from past fires.
This is an area that constantly faces a threat from
just what we're seeing now. This particular wind event exceeds
anything we've seen since, as you were saying, twenty eleven,
(12:31):
probably in terms of sustained wind velocity, low humidities, the
kind of fire danger that we're seeing continued, and of
course these fires themselves are so widespread that there's really
just nothing in recent memory anyway that measures up.
Speaker 3 (12:45):
And we've not even seen the worst of it that's
coming tonight. Between eight pm tonight, two and a half
hours from now and ten am tomorrow morning, that's when
you're going to see, you know, the unbelievable winds. Fremont
came eighty mile an hours arrowhead spring seventy seven miles
an hour running spring seventy four miles an hour and
(13:06):
is at Lytle Creek seventy miles an hour. These are gus,
you know earlier gus Fremont Canyon eighty miles an hour.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
That's hurricane. Is that category one?
Speaker 6 (13:19):
Yeah, exactly. I think about seventy four would be.
Speaker 2 (13:21):
Is that right?
Speaker 6 (13:22):
Right?
Speaker 3 (13:23):
So, I mean, look, we don't live in a hurricane area,
and these winds aren't sustained over you know, four hours
of eighty miles an hour.
Speaker 2 (13:30):
These are gus.
Speaker 3 (13:31):
But still you get a feel for what it might
be like to be in a hurricane when you know,
when these winds hit. There are hundreds of cars that
have been pushed to the side going up to the
highlands in Pacific Palisades and as a fire hydrant that
broke earlier, which presents a huge problem. Cars slammed into
(13:53):
a fire hydrant and they had to shut that thing off.
And it's just it seems like the world is ending
for a lot of people out there.
Speaker 5 (14:00):
Yeah, I mean, in a sense it is. I mean
the landscape is going to change forever. Yeah, it's going
to change semi permanently. You can build back, but it's
going to be different. And they've got to get those
assets up that road, which is why they pushed all
those cars off to the side.
Speaker 3 (14:16):
And you know, when you know next week, next Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, whatever,
there's going to be a whole host of people raising
hell that their car was totaled by the fire department,
and the fire department is going to say we need
to get up to the mountain to save your homes.
And the guy in the car will say I was
told to get out of this car by a cop.
Speaker 2 (14:37):
And there's going to be a lot of lawsuits going on.
Speaker 5 (14:39):
Yeah, I mean, I think a lot of that's going
to happen with the insurance companies, et cetera dealing with it.
But you're right, I mean, the important thing is that
you get you know, pets.
Speaker 6 (14:48):
And people out of there right. Then you deal with.
Speaker 5 (14:53):
Belongings and structures and automobiles. But as long as people
can get out of there safely, that's the priority.
Speaker 3 (15:00):
It is odd to see the bulldozers take these Maseratis
or Mercedes or high end Tesla's and push them out
of the way like they're toy cars. And to watch
that is a little disconcerting. It's it's like, you know,
we know people that that you know that may be
you know, David Howard may have been one of his
(15:21):
cars or buddy that lives up in you know, in
the Highlands up there, and this is not over. I
hope everybody in the Highlands is out by now. I
can't imagine anybody is still there, but maybe they are,
you know, because this fire happened at ten thirty in
the morning. You know, we're still getting back into the
swing of things from New Year's and Christmas and the holidays,
(15:45):
and people may have taken you know, this week off,
or at least, you know, the first couple of days
of this week off, coming back from vacation. There's a
buddy of mine who lives up there, and he's in Mexico.
He has to watch this on TV on his cell
phone from Mexico, and he's just beside himself that he
has a beautiful home up there and it could be
(16:05):
gone by the time he gets back from Mexico. It's
a big deal.
Speaker 5 (16:09):
Ten thousand homes threaten, more than thirty thousand under evacuation orders.
Speaker 2 (16:13):
Okay, we're gonna come back. It's gonna do.
Speaker 3 (16:15):
We'll come back with the raw numbers of this fire
acreage homes, cars, and I tell you what's going on,
and also give you an update on the one acre
fire in Santa Clarita east of Cast Steak, the Gulch fire,
see if they have put that out.
Speaker 2 (16:29):
Hopefully they have.
Speaker 3 (16:30):
It's gonna be a long night. We're gonna be covering
it all night. Moe Kelly will be here seven to midnight.
I'm coming back midnight to three am. Neil Svader from
three am till Handle either five am or six am,
and then it starts all over again tomorrow, Bill Handle, Gary, Shannon,
John and then us again at four pm tomorrow. Do
not change the station. You're gonna need KFI tonight and
(16:53):
tomorrow and for the rest of this week to tell
you what's going on. With all the wind across all
of southern California, You're going to need this station.
Speaker 7 (17:01):
Tonight you're listening to Tim conwaytun You're on demand from
KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 3 (17:09):
We're watching this fire. This fire has reached Palisades Charter
High School property and they firefighters try to keep obviously
this fire away from schools. We know how much we
need the schools, especially recovered from something like this, and
they could not stop this fire from reaching the Palisades
(17:31):
Charter High.
Speaker 5 (17:32):
School property, the Getty Museum there, the Getty Villa, which
is there, you know that endanger apparently under the yeah.
Speaker 6 (17:42):
It is in danger.
Speaker 5 (17:43):
And again I'm seeing conflicting reports from that there's actually
fire there and that I'm seeing LAFD saying the villa
site is currently safe and they're an ongoing contact.
Speaker 3 (17:54):
So twelve hundred acres over ten thousand homes that are
being threatened. If you're watching Channel eleven or Channel two.
Channel two has a great reporter there who's got a
lot of balls right there in the middle of that fire.
Speaker 2 (18:09):
She's great.
Speaker 3 (18:10):
But Channel eleven has had this shot all night long
that looks like hell. It looks like just all of
La is burning, and these fires are going to get
hit with win tonight that'll be stronger than anything we've
had in the last twenty four hours. So from eight
pm in about two hours and twenty minutes till about
(18:35):
ten am tomorrow will be stronger wins than we've had
all day long.
Speaker 6 (18:40):
All right.
Speaker 3 (18:41):
Tim Lynn is with us. He used to fly for KTLA.
He still does some work for the Orange County Sheriff's Department.
And he's going to explain to us why we don't
have any footage from news copters over this fire like
we should.
Speaker 2 (18:54):
Tim Lynn, welcome to KF five.
Speaker 8 (18:57):
Hey, Jimmy, how are you doing?
Speaker 3 (18:58):
Buddy Goodson's with us as well.
Speaker 2 (19:02):
What do you know?
Speaker 3 (19:03):
And why have these news agencies not contacted the Secret
Service to say, hey, give us a break and let
us fly over these fires.
Speaker 8 (19:13):
Well, on the list of priorities the News Service in
the Secret Service world is probably way down to the bottom,
so not much is going to happen. We've tried many
times back in the data, get it from get information
from them to be able to go and go to
an area just outside of THETFR, and they're very reluctant
to let them fly. And the reason is is because
(19:34):
they don't know who is flying that helicopter. You have
not been vetted by the Secret Service, and unless they
know who you are, they don't want you anywhere near
their restricted space. So the reason they can't fly tonight
is because a thirty mile vail around Lax extends well
over the fire area.
Speaker 3 (19:52):
And when does that expire? Do we know tomorrow morning
or tomorrow day time? Sometime?
Speaker 8 (19:57):
Yeah, tomorrow morning. I think the last time I looked
it was about nine o'clock is when it's going to
be lifted.
Speaker 3 (20:03):
So if President Biden leaves at nine at nine oh one,
is it lifted.
Speaker 8 (20:08):
No, it goes for thirty minutes after heat a parts,
so that gives him time to get up and out
of the airspace.
Speaker 2 (20:14):
And it's thirty miles from wherever he is.
Speaker 8 (20:18):
Well, the there's a veil of thirty miles from lax.
Now that's the no fly zone you have. You cannot
fly in that area. But wherever the president is that
they have a sometimes a ten eleven or twelve mile
circle to which no one can fly in. You're absolutely
not allowed to fly there. Fortunately, none of those circles
(20:40):
are up over the fire air but I guarantee you
they would amend that in a hurry. But even police
cannot fly in the ten mile or eleven mile circle
unless they're in direct support of the Secret Service.
Speaker 3 (20:53):
And then what about also, you know we have the
do noton fly zone, the temporary flight restriction that covers
the president. But aren't there also a couple of F
eighteens that are about ten twelve thousand feet in the
air right now?
Speaker 8 (21:09):
Right, they're up there probably you know, eighteen thousand feet.
They call it the Combat Air Patrol, and they're up
there the whole time the President is away from the
White House, and just to make sure that they have
air support in case somebody does make a threatening move
towards the president. So should they aircraft stray into the area,
(21:29):
get into that thirty mile area, they will start inquiring.
They'll send helicopters up, they'll send the jets down and
try to identify that aircraft to give them time to
do whatever they need to do to protect the president.
But yeah, they're very serious about it, and they do
different things to get your attention by flying really close
to you, flying in front of you. And they also
(21:53):
even in the restriction you can read that it says
the even authorized to use deadly force if necessary.
Speaker 2 (21:59):
And they're not and they're willing to do that absolutely.
Speaker 8 (22:03):
That's their job. I mean, if they get the clearance
to do it. But a F eighteen flying by Assessa,
you know, they can fly by and tear the wings
off Assessma without even touching. It would just with awake turbulence.
Speaker 3 (22:14):
All right, Tim, hold on one second, Tim Lenni is
with us. He used to fly for KTLA. We'll put
him on hold and ask him some more questions. He's
flown over a ton of these fires. He can give
us a first a first hand idea of what this
is like, especially flying helicopter in this kind of win.
Speaker 6 (22:30):
This just in.
Speaker 3 (22:31):
President Biden first Lady Jill Biden are headed to downtown
Los Angeles a Los Angeles hotel tonight as a result
of the Pacific Palisades Fire. Biden was in a motorcade
vehicle in West Los Angeles Santa Monica area this morning
for a planned trip to Thermal, which is outside of
Joshua Tree, when officials made the decision to return to
(22:53):
the hotel. A court to the White House. Air Force
one is now expected to leave for Washington early tomorrow
after after noon. So when the strongest winds hit tonight
into tomorrow morning, we're not going to get any coverage
from any news agency until at least early afternoon tomorrow.
Speaker 5 (23:11):
Well you'll get coverage, you just won't get the chopper stuff.
You're talking, right, We're not going to get help, that's right. Yeah,
did I miss speak? Just a We're not going to
get any coverage helicopter coverage.
Speaker 2 (23:22):
Yes, okay, sorry, thank you, thank god you're here.
Speaker 8 (23:24):
Mark.
Speaker 6 (23:26):
Well, you know it takes a lot for me to
correct you.
Speaker 2 (23:28):
I see, I see, all right.
Speaker 3 (23:29):
Okay, so helicopter footage, We're not going to get any
helicopter footage from the news agencies. They're helicopters will be grounded.
Speaker 6 (23:37):
Yeah, any air until tomorrow. Tomorrow. Okay.
Speaker 3 (23:39):
We'll come back and talk to Tim Lynn, who also
flew helicopter and still does and we'll get an idea
of what it's like for these firefighters as well, who
are fighting these fires from the air. We'll ask him
what air assets they can use at night? Can they
use the fixed wing? Can they use the helicopters? This
is going to be a long night for people to
live in southern Californi, especially people live in Pacific Palisades.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
This is a nightmare.
Speaker 5 (24:04):
I'm also curious, Tim, I want to ask when we
come back, what velocity is the threshold after which they
can't fly.
Speaker 6 (24:10):
In those great questions, really really intense wednes tonight.
Speaker 7 (24:13):
Yes, you're listening to Tim Conway Junior on demand from
KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 2 (24:20):
Mark Thompson's here.
Speaker 3 (24:22):
Well, that's not the reason that's finishing. No, it's one though.
But we're watching this fire here in the Palisades.
Speaker 2 (24:28):
It has burned.
Speaker 3 (24:30):
There are ten thousand homes that are threatened, ten thousand homes.
It has reached the Charter High School. We don't know
the extent of the damage there. Thirty thousand people have
been told to evacuate. This fire has gotten down to
and if you're familiar with the town of Palisades, of
(24:51):
Pacific Issades, where Gelson's is, there are trees in the
Gelson's parking lot that are on fire. Trees in the
Gelson's parking lot on fire. Gas station. Next door is
the seventy six station. They're trying to water that down.
God help us if that blows all right, Tim Lynn
is with us. He flew helicopters for Channel five for
(25:13):
quite some time also the Orange County Sheriff's Department. Tim
Mark Thompson had a great question, at what wind velocity
are you grounded when it comes to flying a news helicopter.
Speaker 8 (25:29):
Well, most news helicopters are the a Star or the
Eurocopter helicopters. Now they're now called Airbus and they have
limitations just for starting In the book and so it's
forty miles an hour any direction around the aircraft, or
fifty miles an hour on the nose just to start it.
(25:49):
And that's because the malaise will flex and hit the
tail and you make the problems for you. Yeah, but
in flight, there's no posted restriction. The only thing that'll
happen is that the controls are handled by hydraulic servos,
and if you overload those servos because of turbulence, you're
getting moved and you're moving against the turbulence. It'll do
(26:12):
a thing called servo transparency where it locks up and
it's like losing your power steering and it goes for
just a couple of seconds and let's go it. That
is your indication that you've you've overstepped your bounds and
you need to get on the ground because you know
the aircraft can take a lot, but when you start
getting into that area with an a star especially, that's
(26:33):
when you need to go find find an airport to
land at and wait it out. But now every aircraft
has a different different category. Now that firehawks, the Fire
Department flies, I'm not sure what their categories are, but
I can tell you wins like this It is no picnic.
It is a rough ride.
Speaker 5 (26:50):
But it's likely that their thresholder is higher, is what
you're kind of implying right than the news choppers.
Speaker 8 (26:57):
It could it actually could be lower because of their
way and because of their load they're carrying than two.
They have policy and procedures written in the County Fire
and the City Fire setting down guidelines for win speed,
So they each department will set a guideline outside of
what the aircraft manufacturer has. They will go by their
(27:18):
policy and procedure of their department, and they may have
a win limitation in that policy and procedure, just to
give that big block area of safety to where you know,
we're going to be a little bit safer what the
book says, and make it just a little bit higher,
just to protect our employees.
Speaker 3 (27:37):
Tim Lens with its tim When these they're fighting fires
all night long here and we're expecting the most ferocious
winds of this event to come in in about two
hours from now, all the way till ten am. Is
it easier or harder to fight these fires at night?
And I only think it might be easier because you
(27:57):
can see the hotspots at night.
Speaker 2 (27:58):
Is it tougher or are easier to fight at night.
Speaker 8 (28:02):
Well, you have to realize the pilot will be on
night vision and the problem with that is night vision
uh can get blanked out by the light from the fire.
It doesn't you can't really see the fire, uh that clearly.
You can see the fire clearly, but it's really bright
in an NDG environment, and so to be able to
clear that black terrain that's on either side of the fire,
(28:26):
you have to have those on so you can't look
directly at the fire. And then you you you very
row can't see wires, and you have to be really
careful of that because they're real hard to see at
night and getting in those canyons and down low and
things like that. It's a lot easier to fight during
the day where you can see all the terrain and
hazards as you're coming in, but when you're on goggles
(28:47):
you have to worry about the uh what a wash
out type thing. If you get in looking at the
fire too too big and it's too bright, it tends
to you know, blow them out a little bit where
you have to look away. So, yeah, it's a little
bit harder at night, especially now you don't have good
terrain or good situational awareness because you've taken away one
(29:07):
of your abilities to judge a distance.
Speaker 3 (29:09):
You know, these news helicopters, a lot of them have
what look like giant swords on the front. There's one
on the top and one on the bottom, and those
are to cut power wires in case they hit them.
I guess do they have those on the firefighting helicopters
as well.
Speaker 8 (29:25):
Absolutely? Yeah, So those are on there and they do
help quite a bit. I mean, if you go through
a wire, and unless you're going slow, speed is your
friend if you hit a wire with the wirecutters, because
they don't work very well if you're at a low
rate of speed. So, but you still have to worry
about that wire wrapping around something after it snaps, so
you don't want to hit them.
Speaker 2 (29:46):
Yeah, that's not a great idea.
Speaker 3 (29:48):
You know, watching these fires burn right now, and these
homes burn and there's no firefighters on these homes at all.
I'm watching three of them burn right here on Channel eleven,
and there's no firefighters at all. There's an ambulance that
is driving by, there's a couple of private vehicles that
are driving by, that's got to drive these firefighters crazy
(30:10):
and it probably depresses the hell out of them.
Speaker 8 (30:14):
I'm sure it does. You know, it's a pride thing
to be able to help protect the community they work for,
and their job is to put out the fire and
knock it down and save property and save lives. And
they start losing houses, but they have to keep the
reality of it. You have a very large fire that's
taken out many structures, and as Captain Scott was talking
(30:35):
about earlier, they kind of triage it, They look at it.
If the house is well involved, they go after the
one they can protect. And you know, and it gets
to a point to where firefighter safety becomes an issue,
to where if they can't get out in front of
that fire, especially in wind speeds like this, because it
can throw flames a long way and embers a long way.
(30:55):
As we talk all the time, it can cast those
zimbers up to two miles and that fire come up
over a hill, can roll right over the top of
you because it has sixty five miles an hour wind
behind it, and the last thing you do want to
do is get caught in front of that.
Speaker 3 (31:08):
And even when you know, when we return to normal,
and we will you know, on Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday
of next week when all the fires are out. Everyone's
back to school and everyone's back to normal. Still, the
topography of this of this community, the Pacific Palisades area,
which is spectacularly beautiful, will be changed for the next
(31:29):
five to ten years.
Speaker 8 (31:32):
Yeah, a lot longer than that. It takes a long
time for that vegetation to re establish. Flying down here
in Orange County after the big fire we had a
couple months ago, It's Santiago Peak looks like the moon.
Now it's just completely gray and burned away. A couple
of really nice, pretty green areas we used to fly
through back in there where the hiking trails and you know,
(31:52):
pick people up they got hurt. It's gone. It's just
basically gray dirt now. It's really unfortunate and really source
site to see in that area there. You know, it's
so pretty right along the beach. And also you have
all those folks that are losing everything they own.
Speaker 3 (32:07):
Yeah, Tim, you've been in the news business for a
long time. Tim Linn is with us. Do you get
a sense or have you in the past where people
are either burned out of an area by a fire
or get a close call that they they have a tendency,
especially if they have small kids, to say screw it,
we're going to the valley flats or we're going to
you know, seem Me Valley or Orange County and not
(32:29):
dealing with this headache anymore.
Speaker 8 (32:32):
I you know, I don't have any personal experience with
anybody who's to live through this. I've heard stories of it,
and you have. You know, the people up down both
sides of that line, they though it's not going to
happen again. It's all burned out. We're not having to
come through here again. Well we'll wait. You know, it's
goes like back to the folks that flood every year.
Why are you building your house back? It flooded last year.
(32:54):
It's it's all that depends on how much you're attached
to that area, and some people love of it in
the mountains. A you as simple as that, buddy.
Speaker 3 (33:02):
I appreciate you coming on. We'll talk to you to
night after midnight and coming back. And I heard you're
gonna be a guest.
Speaker 6 (33:07):
I'll be with you, Budy Bikszellen.
Speaker 2 (33:08):
Thank you, sir. All right, Tim Lynn I'm gonna go.
Speaker 3 (33:11):
We'll go to seven o'clock tonight me Mark Thompson, then
Moe Kelly comes in from seven pm till midnight. I'm
coming back at midnight till three am. Nil Savedra from
three am to five am. Amy King, who.
Speaker 2 (33:23):
I was told was uh was Ill, is now recovered.
Speaker 1 (33:29):
Conway Show on demand on the iHeart Radio app.
Speaker 2 (33:33):
Now you can
Speaker 1 (33:33):
Always hear us live on kf I Am six forty
four to seven pm Monday through Friday, and anytime on
demand on the iHeart Radio app
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