Flying south through smoky skies along the famed Malibu coast, the first thing you see is the burned-out mansion—a lonely wreck, smoldering among rows of intact, gleaming beach houses. .
But as one gets closer to Pacific Palisades, ground zero for Los Angeles’ devastating fires, those little charred ruins turn into scattered ruins and then rows of charred, crumpled homes.
Viewed from the air, the extent of the devastation the Palisades Fire wreaked on both neighborhoods began to come into focus: entire streets were reduced to rubble, and the remains of once-glorious homes were now reduced to ashes and memories.
Since the fire began on Tuesday, access to the devastated area has been largely closed to the public, even to evacuated residents.
The fire is the largest of many to cover Los Angeles and has now consumed more than 19,000 acres (7,700 hectares) of land in Pacific Palisades and Malibu.
City Fire Chief Christine Crowley said at Thursday’s meeting that initial estimates numbered “thousands” of destroyed buildings.
There have been at least two separate reports of human remains found in this fire alone, but officials have not yet confirmed the death toll.
“It’s safe to say that the Palisades Fire was one of the most devastating natural disasters in Los Angeles history,” Crowley said.
For AFP journalists surveying the scene from a helicopter on Thursday, it was hard to argue with that view.
The skeletons of buildings on some of the coveted Malibu waterfront parcels favored by celebrities indicate the scale of the damage.
Other multi-million dollar mansions have completely disappeared, seemingly swept into the Pacific Ocean by the Palisades Fire.
Looming above Malibu, Pacific Palisades is a sliver of luxury oceanfront property, a wealthy plateau of pricey real estate that is now deserted.
Not the entire mountain top went dark. Several grand houses escaped unscathed. Some streets were completely spared.
But on the south end of the Palisades, a road lined with stunning homes until Tuesday now resembles a makeshift cemetery.
Where rows of family homes once stood, now only the occasional chimney, blackened tree stumps and charred timbers remain.
At a news conference Thursday, Los Angeles District Attorney Nathan Hochman described walking across Pacific Palisades to the ruins of his sister’s home as feeling like “the end of the world.”
“I haven’t seen a disaster like this happen to our city since the 1990s when Los Angeles suffered fires, floods, earthquakes and riots,” he said.
“It’s crazy,” agreed helicopter pilot Albert Azouz, who has flown these skies for nearly a decade and observed the devastation from the air Thursday.
“All these houses are gone.”
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