"Los Angeles weather is the weather of catastrophe, of apocalypse, and, just as the reliably long and bitter winters of New England determine the way life is lived there, so the violence and the unpredictability of the Santa Ana affect the entire quality of life in Los Angeles, accentuate its impermanence, its unreliability. The wind shows us how close to the edge we are."
--Joan Didion
There was a desert wind blowing that night. It was one of those hot dry Santa Anas that come down through the mountain passes and curl your hair and make your nerves jump and your skin itch. On nights like that every booze party ends in a fight.
--Raymond Chandler
(More on all of this when power is restored.)
21 comments:
Our thoughts and prayers are with all of you. Wish we were there to help with the clean up!
My heart is just breaking! Those trees!!! Those homes!!
Be safe.
Thanks, guys. I'm kind of in shock at how many beautiful, heritage trees are now overturned in streets. So grateful more homes weren't seriously damaged like in Temple City.
Terrible.
This is one for the history books. Still no power up on Alta Vista, and it looks like most of the other folks on the hill are in the same boat. We went to downtown Pasadena and looked at the carnage on Green Street. Those oaks don't seem to have strong root structures, most of them are just ripped out of the ground. Plenty of other varieties of trees snapped farther up. I sincerely hope that the wood goes to make furniture or useful purpose, not just to a chipper. Those trees are so old and great, I'll miss their shade!
I keep looking at photos, reports, updates---just amazed. If anyone says there aren't tornados in LA, well, just take a gander at the photos folks! Except these cover a swath the size of the entire Basin!
Looking at the SCE outage map, looks like things are still down and "they are aware of problems and working on it". Which means it may be a while still.
Considering the winds, it doesn't surprise me at the number of trees down, but does impress me that more structures aren't impacted (from trees or the wind itself). Building to quake code seems to be pretty good for tornados too!
Hope y'all survived last night ok and that things are restored, repaired and cleaned up asap.
Raymond Chandler was right. Hope you all recover quickly.
WV: skinglos - what happens during Santa Ana inn
Still no power at our place either.
I'm thinking good thoughts of you and your family. Having been through a severe hurricane as a child, I know something of the pain. I hope things return to normal soon. I'm sad about the trees and the damage overall. But glad you are safe.
After surviving the winds Wednesday night in Altadena I thought for sure we'd been hit hardest but the pictures from Pasadena, South Pas and Temple City prove otherwise. I'm so sad about the loss of these majestic trees.
The quotes are fabulous.
4 seasons: fire, flood, earthquake, and...
windstorm..
We may be in for a rough road. So Cal Edison reports that they have zero estimates for restoring power to South Pas, urging residents to stock supplies and "prepare for an extended outage."
Holy. Crap.
Weather forecast for Sunday: lows in the 30s. What a mess.
In all my years of living in LA, I somehow managed to avoid what is happening there now. But I do know how fierce those Santa Ana winds can be. I hope everyone is safe and that your power gets restored soon. We once went for seven days without power in the middle of December up here in WA state. It was not pretty, to say the least. Good luck to everyone.
I can't take it any more. My house is 50 degrees and I'm catching cold. Trying to book a hotel but so many others beat me to it. This is getting scary.
I have central heating, an electric stove, uverse phone and no fireplace so I pretty much can't do anything except use my cell phone and wear my ski clothes. My neighbors left for a hotel yesterday. I thought for sure things would be up and running by now. I wish my office was open over the weekend. It's warm there and has a microwave!
Christine T
i've never experienced something like this in the SGV before. the streetscapes in South Pas will never be the same. i had no idea so much of the city is still without power, mine came back last night, but i live south of Huntington. hang in there Laurie!
Man. Even if people had wood burning fireplaces, they could gather 'round, but where do you shower? How do you keep anything cold enough not to spoil? UGH UGH UGH
This is the pits.
a friend out in Arcadia was told by all the utilities that it'll be at LEAST 3 days more before services may be restored. thankfully, that friend went out and bought the last generator at Costco a few days ago.
from the looks of the SCE map, they are now giving estimates for restoring power, tho some of those are showing "currently being re-evaluated" instead of a time. Most in SoPas are showing either by midnight tonight or ~6am tomorrow. Hope that stays true.
So sad to see the change in landscape in SoPas and the rest of SGV, but it is part of the process. Were these trees felled in Yosemite, we'd let them stay as is. So do something next spring to counter all this--plant native trees, that can sustain themselves, in places that are lacking.
And pile on the blankets Laurie! Stay warm!
Our huge ash tree that shaded the deck ripped apart and bits fell on our two cars. If we'd known there would be hurricane force winds, we'd have parked the cars somewhere else. The ash was the only tree we didn't have trimmed this year - we couldn't afford to do all the trees at once. Oh well, the insurance has been very efficient and I get to choose a new car.
I hope someone will write a poem or story to honor the beautiful trees that have died. First we lose all the trees in the mountains in the fire, now this. Sad.
Hope you get the electricity back soon. We were off until 6 am this morning, and I don't think I could have taken more, it got pretty cold in the house. Good luck tomorrow!
don't apologize for mourning the loss of SO many trees and so much property damage. It is your own little war zone. No power, no water for a time and missing so many trees is devastating in its own right.
Take pics, lots of them. Maybe a fund can be set up to replant trees---sell a book of what photos you can find of the old trees and some of how they met their end and anything inbetween of note (I heard the tree outside of Einstein's old house near CalTech bit the big one). Gotta be a solution to help replant trees...this treehugger has been a little misty eyed over the few photos I've seen.
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