You are now in California and the U.S. Media Coverage News category.

State to Probe Why Pacific Palisades Reservoir Was Offline, Empty When Firestorm Exploded

/in , , /by /Los Angeles Timesby Matt Hamilton

A large reservoir in Pacific Palisades that is part of the Los Angeles water supply system was out of commission when a ferocious wildfire destroyed thousands of homes and other structures nearby, the Los Angeles Times found.

Officials said that the Santa Ynez Reservoir had been closed since about February for repairs to its cover, leaving a 117-million-gallon water storage complex empty in the heart of the Palisades for nearly a year.

Full Story

Fact-Checking Misinformation About the Los Angeles Wildfires and California Water Policy

/in , , /by /PBS

President-elect Donald Trump and some social media users and pundits blamed Los Angeles’ deadly fires on California Gov. Gavin Newsom, saying the Democrat’s environmental policies enabled the blazes’ danger and wreckage.

As of Jan. 12, authorities counted at least 16 people dead, more than 35,000 acres burned and thousands of structures damaged or destroyed.

Full Story

Why Hydrants Ran Dry as Firefighters Battled California’s Deadly Fires

/in , , /by /Los Angeles Timesby Ian James

As crews have fought the fast-spreading fires across the Los Angeles area, they have repeatedly been hampered by low water pressure and fire hydrants that have gone dry. These problems have exposed what experts say are vulnerabilities in city water supply systems not built for wildfires on this scale.

Full Story

Almost 1 Million Tijuana Residents to Go Without Water Beginning Friday

/in , , /by /Fox 5 San Diegoby Salvador Rivera

Almost 1 million residents from 632 neighborhoods throughout Tijuana and Rosarito will be without water service through the weekend starting Friday.

Jesús García Castro, director of the State Commission of Public Services in Tijuana, says crews need to repair a large leak on one of the main lines that delivers water to the entire region.

Full Story

Intensifying Climate ‘Whiplash’ Set the Stage for Devastating California Fires

/in , , /by /Los Angeles Timesby Ian James

The devastating wildfires that have ravaged Southern California erupted following a stark shift from wet weather to extremely dry weather — a phenomenon scientists describe as “hydroclimate whiplash.”

New research shows these abrupt wet-to-dry and dry-to-wet swings, which can worsen wildfires, flooding and other hazards, are growing more frequent and intense because of human-caused climate change.

Full Story

The Water Mystery Unfolding in the Western U.S.

/in , , /by /NPRby Zachary Ziegler, Darian Woods, Cooper Katz McKim and Kate Concannon

There’s a rural area in Arizona with massive groundwater basins underneath the earth. Water should be plentiful there, but wells are running dry. Today on the show, what’s behind the water issues in rural Arizona?

Full Story

In Los Angeles, water runs short as wildfires burn out of control

/in , , /by /Reutersby Jackie Luna, Kanishka Singh, Jonathan Allen and Hannah Lang
Full Story

Fire Hydrants Ran Dry in Southern California Just When They Were Needed Most

/in , , /by /AP Newsby Brittany Peterson and Michael Phillis

The water system used to fight the Palisades fire in Los Angeles buckled under the demands of what turned out to be the most destructive fire in city history, with some hydrants running dry as they were overstressed without assistance from firefighting aircraft for hours early Wednesday.

 

Full Story

Too Wet and Too Dry: The Crazy North-South Gap in California’s Rain

/in , , /by /Cal Mattersby Alastair Bland

A remarkably wet kickoff to Northern California’s rainy season has coincided with a desperately dry fall in Southern California — a huge disparity, perhaps unprecedented, between the haves and have-nots of rainfall.

Los Angeles usually gets several inches of rain by now, halfway into the rainy season, but it’s only recorded a fifth of an inch downtown since July, its second driest period in almost 150 years of record-keeping. The rest of Southern California is just as bone-dry.

Full Story

Southern California Is Dangerously Dry for This Time of Year

/in , , /by /New York Timesby Amy Graff

Southern California is extremely dry right now, with huge portions of the region having seen less than a quarter-inch of rain in the last eight months. The landscape is parched and vegetation is withered, making the area dangerously susceptible to burning, an unusual situation for January.

“The sort of dryness we’re seeing in a lot of the plant species right now mirrors what you would typically expect in October or early November, when the rainy season starts,” said Jonathan O’Brien, a meteorologist with the U.S. Forest Service.

Full Story