Several wildfires are burning in Southern California. Thousands of homes were destroyed by the flames and more than 150,000 people have evacuated.
KSBY News spoke to people from Los Angeles County who chose to evacuate in the Santa Ynez Valley as the devastation from the wildfires continues to impact thousands of lives.
“We just needed to get out before we got any evacuation warnings,” said Amy, visiting from Sherman Oaks. “We came out last night after work, headed out, and got here.”
Amy told KSBY News she decided to quickly pack her bags to escape the wildfires surrounding her community in Los Angeles County.
The Palisades Fire and Kenneth Fire are not too far from where she lives.
She told me it was taking a toll on her and her husband’s health.
“We're getting a lot of smoke in our apartment and we're on the top floor,” said Amy. ‘It's just hard. It's been affecting our health. My eyes are watering and burning. My husband's dealing with a health issue as well, so it's just impacting the way he was handling the day.”
While thousands of people have been displaced from the wildfires, Amy tells us she has family and friends who have lost everything.
“Driving through the thick of it—just like really hits you differently,” said Amy. “Seeing the burnt hills around you, seeing the black smoke. It's really depressing to see that and to know how many. I have lots of friends that lost homes and family members that lost homes and hearing their stories has been heartbreaking.”
Philip Decker, a Montebello resident, is staying in Solvang with his family and says wildfires in California are quite common.
“We see this almost every year,” said Decker. “There's some fires somewhere. But this time it was in areas that are bad. I saw the Getty Center as the fires raging towards the Getty Center. Just thinking of all that art that would get destroyed. All the homes that were in Palisades that were just obliterated.”
Jesse, a resident from Los Angeles, says he chose to get away from the area due to the conditions.
“I just wanted to get to get of the L.A. area,” said Jesse. “Since we didn’t know this town. I’ve never been here, so I'm like, let's just go.”
