The Woodley and Sunset fires were brought under control after sparking on Wednesday,

The Lidia Fire, spanning over 300 acres on Canyon Road in Los Angeles County, was 60% contained on Thursday, according to Cal Fire.

The Kenneth Fire, which crossed through both Los Angeles and Ventura counties, grew close to 1,000 acres with zero containment as of Thursday night.

\"Right now, it is still a very, very dangerous situation, and anybody in that zone needs to evacuate,\" Cleetus said.

Why firefighters weren't able to contain the fires immediately

Several meteorological impacts contributed to the inability to contain the fires quickly, including humidity as low as 10% and a windstorm with gusts up to 100 mph that carried embers far and wide to ignite a tinderbox landscape Just 0.16 inches of rain has fallen in the region since May, according to meteorology and fire experts, leaving the landscape parched.

Containing the fire as winds gusted at those speeds in some spots would have been virtually impossible, the experts said.

\"This is just a catastrophic confluence of factors that has made it really, really difficult to contain these fires,\" Cleetus said.

\"PHOTO:
Josh Edelson/AFP via Getty Images
PHOTO: Firefighters work the scene as an apartment building burns during the Eaton fire in the Altadena area of Los Angeles county, Calif., on Jan. 8, 2025.
>

In addition, the urban setting makes managing these types of fires much more difficult, the experts said.

In Northern California, where fires tend to be fueled by large amounts of brush in forests and wildlands, firefighters can better manage them through fire-suppression activity, Quinn-Davidson said.

But in a populated region like Los Angeles County, the spread is moving quickly from house to house as people try to evacuate -- in this case even ditching cars that block roads in an attempt to outrun the flames, Quinn-Davidson said.

\"There's nothing more dangerous and difficult than fighting in close and urban settings,\" Cleetus said.

In addition, the firefighters have been using residential water supplies and have seen some instances where hydrants ran dry, Quinn-Davidson said.

Climate change also played a role in the severity of the fires

Wildfires are a natural and necessary part of Earth's cycle, but climate change and other more direct human influences have increased their likelihood, research shows.

\"PHOTO:
Nic Coury/AP
PHOTO: Embers are blown off a burning tree as the Eaton Fire burns in Altadena, Calif., Jan. 8, 2025.
>

Wildfires in the western U.S. have become larger, more intense and more destructive in recent decades due to a combination of factors, including rapid urbanization and human-amplified climate change, according to the federal government's Fifth National Climate Assessment, a breakdown of the latest in climate science, published in November 2023.

Warming temperatures, drier conditions and shifts in precipitation are contributing to an increase in the frequency of large wildfires and acres of land burned in the U.S. each year, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

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