ALTADENA: Flames were licking his fence, he was choking on smoke, and bullets were whizzing by his leg. Despite it all, Tristin Perez never left his Altadena home during the deadly Eaton fire.
The 34 year old carpenter felt he had no choice but to stay despite the life threatening conditions. A police officer told him and his neighbors to evacuate early on Wednesday (Jan 8) morning as the fire raced down the hillside above them.
Instead, Perez insisted on trying to save his property and his neighbors’ homes along El Molino Avenue. But he didn’t even have a garden hose. He ripped the filters from two water pitchers and doused the ground, his wooden fence and every ember he could reach.
“Your front yard is on fire, palm trees lit up, it looked like something out of a movie,” Perez told Reuters in an interview in his driveway. “I did everything I could to stop the line and save my house, help save their houses.”
His one-story yellow duplex survived. So did two more homes next door. Across the street, entire houses burned to the ground. A single brick chimney stood alone in the wreckage.
“When you look across the street… If I wasn’t here, that is what would have happened,” he said. “I felt so bad for them. It’s absolutely awful.”
Perez mourned the losses here. He moved to Altadena three years ago and rented his two bedroom unit. He fell in love with the tranquil and tight-knit community of about 40 000 people north of Los Angeles, where neighbors are friendly and look out for each other.
As of late Saturday, officials said the Eaton fire was 15 percent contained, and that the fire threat remains high across the Los Angeles area. Overall, six simultaneous blazes that have ripped across Los Angeles County neighborhoods since Tuesday have killed at least 16 people and damaged or destroyed 12 000 structures.
