LA Prepares to Prevent Disaster with Community Fire and Evacuation Drill

In a coordinated, proactive effort, the Los Angeles Fire Department, Police Department, Department of Transportation and City Council took dramatic steps this weekend to protect LA County residents from what is predicted to be the worst fire season in LA history, by staging a first-of-its-kind, full-scale fire and evacuation drill in the Hollywood Hills.

Last year, U.S. wildfires set a record, destroying more than 13,500 square miles - the equivalent of Massachusetts, Connecticut and Rhode Island combined. One fire alone, just north of Los Angeles, swept through more than 250 square miles costing more than $70 million in damage. 

The purpose of the disaster response drill was to let local residents know what to do when a real fire breaks out, how and why they should prepare for one in advance, and exactly how to evacuate their homes if the need should arise.

In a city notorious for its fire season LA brush fires started three months early this year. In May, 150 firefighters battled a blaze that blackened more than 800 acres in Los Angeles’ Griffith Park. And with this being the driest year in the 130 years records have been kept for the area, city and county officials are very concerned.

Saturday’s exercise was a full-fledged enactment of what will occur in the event of a major brush fire in the Hollywood Hills. Police officers with loudspeakers blaring raced though the neighborhood announcing the drill and calling on residents to evacuate to a local school, while fire fighters and other emergency personnel carried out all the actions they would take when a fire really breaks out in the area.

At the end of the drill a major fire broke out less than a mile away from the staging area, and with fire crews so so close by the fire was rapidly brought under control with no casualties. 

Volunteers, who were out in force providing help to the firefighters in May, participated in this execise, including the Red Cross, Community Emergency Response Team and Scientology Volunteer Ministers. "Our volunteers feel it is very important to support this program," said Veronica Albano, spokesperson for the Scientology Volunteer Ministers, a program developed in 1978 by L. Ron Hubbard as a community outreach activity. "By holding exercises like this to inform the community about what to do when a real disaster strikes, our city and county agencies are saving lives."