Los Angeles, California – Bill Threadgill was digging up the ashes of his home in Altadena, California, where he lived for 15 years, extracting copper pipes and setting them aside to sell.

Only his chimney and the two porch posts remained standing, and nothing else. A massive fire burned the entire structure to the ground.

Even before the fires swept through the area, his family was struggling to make ends meet. “We have been under a lot of financial pressure,” Threadgill, a skilled worker and caregiver, said through an N95 face mask.

On January 7, the Eaton Fire broke out in the nearby mountains, forcing thousands of residents to move evacuation. The fire, which was fanned by hurricane-force winds, damaged or destroyed more than 5700 buildings At least 16 people were killed.

He was one of A series of fires That has torn through the Los Angeles area for the past week and a half, made worse by climate change. In all, approximately 12,000 buildings and 25 people were destroyed killing.

The fires could become one of the costliest natural disasters in U.S. history, with experts estimating $250 billion in damage.

While multi-million-dollar homes were destroyed in the affluent Pacific Palisades area, the working-class neighborhood of Altadena was also devastated. devastating.

Some of the victims were elderly or disabled and were unable to escape. Threadgill himself lived with and cared for a 73-year-old friend, whom he considered family. She was in short-term convalescent care at the time of the fire. She has no home to return to.

As he walked through the wreckage, he looked for his calico cat, Catra. He added: “I hope she got out, because I left the back door open for her to get out.”

He looked at where his front door was. “I won’t get in here like this anymore. Never again,” said Threadgill. “It was uprooted unexpectedly. “It is devastating.”

House near the mountains

Located near the foothills of the San Gabriel Mountains, Altadena is a proud African American and immigrant community. Of its population of 42 thousand people, 58% of them are people of color.

The community began to take shape in the 1960s. Large numbers of black families left the southern United States and moved west, as part of a trend known as the Great Migration. Altadena was one of the few neighborhoods in the area where African Americans had access to home loans at the time.

Over the years, prominent black artists have settled in the community, including Academy Award-winning actor Sidney Poitier and acclaimed science fiction writer Octavia Butler.

Butler, who is buried in nearby Mountain View Cemetery, wrote a novel called Parable of the Sower, which is set in Los Angeles against the backdrop of raging wildfires — something locals and fans of the book have drawn parallels with during the current crisis.

Today, 18% of Altadena’s population is black, a significantly higher percentage than neighboring Pasadena.

On January 7, the neighborhood was under a red flag warning, and the flag conditions were ideal for fires.

The weather was warm. The vegetation was unusually dry. The Santa Ana winds were blowing strong.

On that day, when the Eaton Fire burned in the mountains, Threadgill felt relaxed. “I was 100 percent [certain] He said that the fire at the top of the hills would not fall here.

Then the wind blew and carried the flames towards his house. As he gathered bags of belongings and loaded them into his truck, he felt the heat of the flames.

“As I was walking down the street, there were embers under my feet, so I had to run at that point. And the rest is history. It caught on fire,” he said.

Down the street from Threadgill, Elisa Gonzalez and her husband arrived home from vacation on Jan. 7 in a cloud of smoke above the city. They started unpacking, but when the wind picked up, they repacked their bags and emptied their belongings.

When they returned the next day, they saw that the house next door had burned down. Embers are still burning throughout the neighborhood.

But Gonzalez noticed several community members in her backyard, spraying her house with water. She credits them with saving her home.

“It was amazing. I couldn’t believe that people all over the neighborhood were doing everything they could to save the remaining buildings,” she said.

Threadgill was one of the people who washed houses on their street after he lost his home. “I was doing everything I could to help,” he said.

While it’s not yet clear what started the Eaton Fire, some residents who lost their homes are filing a lawsuit against Southern California Edison, alleging that the utility company’s electrical equipment started the fire.

They also claim it was negligent to run electricity through the facility’s power lines during the red flag warning.

“It really bothers me to know that it may have been negligence on their part,” Gonzalez said. “It makes me feel really upset, because I think this could have been prevented.”

Rebuilding the future

Despite the devastation, Gonzalez emphasized her gratitude to her neighbors.

“The community has been amazing. The community saved our house,” Gonzalez said.

As she spoke, two women wearing N95 masks stopped in the car and offered her food. They explained that they lived in the neighborhood and wanted to help.

“It’s been like this all week,” Gonzalez explained as she accepted soup, sandwiches and pasta.

Mutual aid efforts have sprung up across Altadena. At the neighboring Community Action Center in Pasadena, day laborers put out a call for supplies on Wednesday after the fires broke out.

Hundreds of volunteers attended to distribute donations to forest fire victims and remove rubble.

On Sunday, Dongdao Riccardi, a chef at a popular Thai restaurant in Altadena, went to the job center to stock up on food to take home. Her restaurant is located in an evacuation zone and remains closed to the public.

Riccardi said she does not know how long the restaurant will remain closed. “I feel very sad for everyone.”

Her husband has recently had two surgeries – open-heart surgery followed by eye surgery – and is unable to work at the moment. Until the fires broke out, she was their sole breadwinner. And now her salaries are gone.

Riccardi moved from Thailand to the United States in 1993. The following year, she was exposed to the Northridge earthquake that struck Los Angeles. Although that experience was frightening, she said that the fires disturbed her more.

“It’s hard for me to sleep, because it hit me so hard. I’ve never seen anything like this. The fire really shook me up a lot,” she said.

Riccardi is eligible for unemployment benefits and plans to apply for them this week. “I hope we can reopen it again,” she said of the restaurant.

She added that her boss “will try to reopen its doors, but no one can go there.” “It will take some time.”

As for Threadgill, he wants to rebuild his house in the same place. “We will definitely do that, and we definitely want to rebuild.” His daughter started online Fundraising To help him.

“I don’t want to leave here. Altadena is great,” he said.