wildfires wreaking havoc in southern california. tens of thousands of people evacuated as hundreds of homes are destroyed and the situation has already

turned deadly. we have live team coverage and the frantic and desperate situation. plus, a live look at san francisco city hall, a new mayor taking office in the city by the bay in about 30 minutes from now. what's in store for danielle laurie's inauguration today? good morning. thanks for joining us for our midday newscast. i'm marcus washington. and i'm laura garcia. we are awaiting a news conference from president biden and governor newsom as multiple wildfires continue to burn in southern california, one of which has already turned deadly. we have a live look at one of them, the altadena fire. it has literally exploded in size. nbc bay area's kris sanchez will have t that part of the story coming up in just moments. but first, nbc news jennifer bjorklund is on the ground right now at the palisades fire. this is in pacific palisades. and, jennifer, needless to say, first responders there definitely. they have their hands full. oh,

this is unbelievable. marcus. laura, i have covered fires my entire career living in california, starting with the oakland hills fire, which all of your viewers, i'm sure are very familiar with. but i got to tell you, i have never seen winds sustained in the direction that they're going for this amount of time. it's been 24 hours and still you can see the flags around here. this wind is blowing this way towards the ocean, bringing the fire down the hill. and actually last night it jumped over pch, pacific coast highway. we're in the gladstones parking lot here. and you know the bay watch. a lifeguard stands were burned and some of the homes along pch this way were burned on the water side. so this is a fire of an intensity that we have not seen in a generation in, in this area. and just even living, you know, an hour from here in the

valley, the winds were sustained overnight for so long that it was just unbelievable. they just didn't let up. and they aren't expected to let up until the weekend in any big way. so the number one thing that usually happens overnight is the fire lays dow and the firefighters have a chance to kind of get in there and do some good work. that didn't happen overnight. overnight was the worst wind period, and they had to actually ground all the helicopters that usually are able to go in and make those very precise water drops. without that, because they are less effective and more dangerous in this wind. any helicopter dropping fire, the water will dissipate before it even hits the grounund. so it's totally ineffective and also very dangerous. so very little advantage to that. so in the absence of that, fire crews just have to do their best with hoses. the water evaporates as the fire comes down like a blowtorch. so this has been a very, very difficult time here in l.a. county. you know, for

everybody involved all over the city. it's like darkness. it's like night. and it's not going to let up anytime soon. marcus. laura. jennifer. it is simply heartbreaking for us to watch up here in northern california. we wish you and your crew the very best. we know you've done extensive coverage there. thank you so much for taking the time to join us. now, of course, pacific palisades is not the only fire wreaking havoc at this hour. we want to turn now to kris sanchez. she has been tracking three other wildfires, triggering evacuations and really carving a path of destruction there. so, kris, one of those fires, as laura was just saying early, it's already been deadly. right. so, sadly, we can confirm that two people died in the eaton fire, which is burning in the altadena pasadena area, along with the angeles national forest, which just exploded in size overnight because of those winds that jennifer bjorklund was talking about. the eaton fire, now at 10,600 acres. and the danger, as she said, is far from over and in fact, is getting worse by

daylight. you can see not only the destruction of the eaton fire there in the pasadena area, but the fire that also continues to burn in the areas where there isn't really much left to burn. and there are also injuries among the residents there and also among the firefighters. now, overnight, a pasadena nursing home had to be evacuated. and you see health care workers pushing some of the patients away in wheelchairs. there was aity bus that came to pick them up because there weren't enough ambulances. the evacuation order warned of immediate threat to life, the wildfires, raging unchecked and again, is now more than 10,000 acres. at a press conference today, fire and law enforcement from around l.a. county echoed the same message. they said, if you are told to get out, you have to get out. we want to make sure that everybody understands we are absolutely not out of danger yet. but if you are told to evacuate and given an order, there is nothing worth your

life. the longer that you wait to evacuate, the more you are putting people in danger who are putting their lives on the line. and sadly, we already know that several firefighters have been injured. the fire is also threatening the san fernando valley now and the surrounding area. this one started just before 1030 last night, and while it's just at about 500 acres right now, we have seen how fast the santa ana winds can fuel those flames and really drive them in another direction. fire officials say it is burning in the footprint of the 9000 acre saddle ridge fire of 2019. there is also a fourth fire burning the 7500 acre woodley fire that started at 615 this morning near the sepulveda basin. if you are familiar with that area, the la fire chief says southern california agencies right now are stretched to maximum capacity, and that's why an alameda county strike team took off for the fire lines overnight. they are now joining

firefighters from san francisco, oakland, hayward, fremont, oregon, nevada and washington state. fire fight is far from over, with cal fire bracing for more dangerous conditions. and overnight. governor newsom announced that he had secured fema funds for the fire fight. we expect to hear from governor newsom, who may be joined by president biden, who was already in southern california, where his event yesterday had to be delayed because of this windstorm. but kari very disheartening to hear that the winds are going to be sticking around for a while. well, yeah, we saw it with jennifer's live shot there. you heard them. i mean, they're up against so much with these winds and they're high. it's just unbelievable to see this going on. and this is the highest level of a threat of a fire danger that we could possibly see. and then we want to get you oriented with this map of the four fires that are burning. actually, the numbers of acres burned has just gone beyond what we had even in the last hour. so the palisades fire

near the coast, just to the north and west of santa monica, we have the woodley fire that is also continuing to burn very quickly. and then the hurst fire that you see that's just west of san fernando. and then we have the eaton fire that is also off towards the east of glendale. so just looking at all of those fires on the map and this red flag warning that has been extended through tomorrow, and it may not be until friday when the wind starts to calm down with the santa ana wind event, we get high pressure that builds east of the sierra that forces the wind to come through the mountain, and as it does so, it's compressed and warmed up, but it also dries out as it moves through the desert. and any remaining humidity continues to decrease as it squeezes through those canyons and creates those very strong winds that we've seen topping over 100mph in some of these cases. so we have the hot, dry conditions as well as the very high fire danger as all of this

wind blows offshore. and you saw in jennifer's live shot just how strong those winds were blowing. yesterday we saw this fire explode, the palisades fire. and this has been the case for a lot of the fires that have been developing. and then the embers that are created from those flames as they go up in the air, creates that rapid rate of spread. we are still seeing winds at 70 to 80mph sustained. and then into the evening we're looking at 30 to 40mph. those winds that will continue even as the wind calms down tonight. we know that a fire that large can create its own weather conditions. you start to get fire and fire whirls, which spreads the fire even farther in a different, very erratic direction. so you can see that even as the wind remains quite brisk through tomorrow and into the next couple of days, this is such a dangerous situation that we're seeing unfolding. and we also have been talking about how

dry it is in southern california, only getting 0 to 10% of their normal amount of rainfall, only a few hundredths of an inch of rainfall over the past couple of months. and so it remains critically dry. we've also had some winds here in the bay area right now it's mainly in the hills and mountains. some of those upper elevations, and we are seeing some much better conditions despite the high winds, because of the amount of rainfall we've had recently. so we're watching this and also monitoring what's going on in southern california. definitely our thoughts and all of our prayers are with all of our friends and family there in southern california. back to you completely. how can they not be? thank you so much, kari. of course, we'll continue to bring you updates on these wildfires throughout our newscast and on our website, nbcbayarea.com. we're constantly updating everything for you. make sure you also download our app to stay current. well, back here at home a new overnight here in the bay area. strong winds are also

causing some problems, in some cases toppling trees or utility poles. i want you to check out this video. this is from alameda and you can see one tree toppled over on union street. this is near central avenue. one homeowner saying that two of his vehicles are damaged. and another case, a pole, fell along clement street street. we do now know that the power there has been restored to those affected areas. meanwhile, in oakland, all three lanes of highway 13 are open again. this is after crews cleared a fallen tree in the southbound direction near redwood road. new video also shows another fallen tree at broadway terrace. this is near southbound 13 exit. all of those lanes are back open. we want to take you back to southern california once again. this is a live look in santa monica. as you see, president biden and governor newsom will soon be delivering an update on the out-of-control wildfires that are happening. it sounds like they're getting a briefing right now. let's see if we can listen in. gusts up to 100 miles an hour east, pushing offshore. we

began increasing our staffing. local, state and federal agencies. hundreds of firefighters began moving on sunday afternoon from northern california into southern california. my local partners began up staffing their own fire stations and helicopters, fire engines, hand crews to be prepared for an incident like this that occurred. those resources were pre-positioned in counties throughout southern california for an event just like this. and on tuesday morning, the palisades fire began. i'd now like to introduce you to chief crowley, who can touch on the palisades fire chief. thank you. thank you so much, mr. president. i'm here just to provide you a brief on three significant fires that have occurred within the city of los angeles. with that, i'm going to be focusing on the palisades fire. that fire broke out yesterday morning around 1030. we did pre-deploy a number of resources. we knew this was there was a potential for a

significant threat to our constituents due to the weather event. high, high, high winds. i've never seen the winds in my 25 year career, so we leaned forward as much as possible and pre-deployed with that, we had a significant amount of fire that fire attack. the fire has grown from originally ten acres to 10,802 acres as we speak. it's an active, active fire fight with our firefighters, and they're doing their very best to protect our people within this area. interestingly enough, because of the winds and the low humidity, we had a second fire also break out, and that was the hurst fire, which is just north of that area. again, this was close to 11,000 acres. this is close to 500 acres. that also broke out. the information that i want to share with you is also the significance of multiple fires in the area, within the city, but also the county. that's the second fire that

actually came out, and we are actively engaged in that firefight. the third fire then broke out this morning at 4:00 in the morning, in which we have an active firefight there as well. we're working with our local jurisdictions, our state regional as well as federal. so we're doing everything we can to protect life first and property. next, we'll go ahead and then pass this off to police chief mcdonald. thank you. thank you. chief. mr. president, it's an honor to be able to be here and be part of this and represent the men and women of lapd and policing to support our partners in the fire service. what we saw here in the last 24 hours is unprecedented. i've never seen anything like this. fires driven by the type of winds that we saw up to 100 miles an our our role out there is strictly support to be there for evacuations, to get people out of the affected area, to be able to provide for traffic control and then crime suppression as the fire is fought and some may come in and

try and take the opportunity to go into these homes and steal from them. so we're going to be on top of that. i just wanto say the relationship we enjoy here, in my case under the leadership of mayor bass, but all of our elected officials is unlike, i think, anywhere else in the country. we are blessed to have the relationship between police and fire that we do here. unfortunately, we do this kind of thing frequently, never to this level, but i can't say enough about how important that is. and as we go into the next five years with the super bowl and the world cup and the olympics coming up, it's critical that we maintain those partnerships. so thank you for this opportunity, sir. next up. oh, sorry. let me introduce my partner from the county fire department, chief tony maloney. yeah. so thank you, mr. president. i'm going to be giving you an update on our eaton fire, which is east county. the county starts all the way up in lancaster and goes all the way down to the long beach border. we go from the county line in ventura all the

way out to pomona, 4300 acres. so we have a fire east of the palisades fire that began last night. it's called the eaton fire. it's currently 10,600 acres, 0% containment. we have over 750 firefighters on the line. unfortunately, two people have lost their lives. residents have lost their lives at the eaton fire. it's impacting tens of thousands of homes, not only in the city of pasadena, but also the county area of altadena. and we're doing our very best. we just had our out of state resources arrive from arizona at the eaton fire to assist us. last night, as the region one coordinator, i contacted the governor's office of emergency services. we requested 250 additional engines into l.a. county with 1000 personnel. we also are using our

our compacts with other states like arizona, nevada, oregon and washington. firefighters from those regions are on their way down to los angeles county right now to assist us. so thank you for your interest. thank you for your attention. governor. you asked for a second. folks. the fact is that the dod. has to rapidly provide additional firefighting personnel across california national guard is having two monster air firefighting system, and two more are being readied for the national guard and the nevada national guard for more

are coming from marin, from the northern command and the ten navy helicopters. in order to mckivitz coming down kris sanchez perershing sqre anything and everything as long as it takes to take these fires. and caltrans raj to make surehat they have a long way to. stand on the things that they need. and i think you've asked, have you done that? quite the contrary, mr. president. just first of all, that major disaster declaration approved the next level of appreciation on behalf of all the residents here in southern california. as the chief said, we have pre-positioned assets this weekend in anticipation of these weather events. the complexity of multiple fires, the likelihood of these other events this event will continue over the course of the next many days. the impacts of over 1000

structures already destroyed, 100 plus thousand people that have been evacuated, lives lost, traditions, lifestyles, places torn asunder, history to the world, to us. and then just publicly, because i think this is important. the president happened to be in the region, in town. it's impossible for me to express the level of appreciation and cooperation we received from the white house in this administration. so behalf of all of us, mr. president, thank you for being here, but not just being here today. thank you for being here. since the minute of this incident with the ten acre fire, less than 24, seven hours to go deeper into it, it's astounding what's happening, right? now. i want to give my son lives out here. and his wife out there. they got notification yesterday. they're hoping on the ground today. the parents are still standing. we're not sure if the good news is i'm a great grandfather. as

of today. his granddaughter. baby girl. baby boy. so i remember this day for a lot. chris carlson. thank you. press, press. thank you. press. we were just listening in to a news conference in santa monica. of course, you saw president joe biden, who's now in california, assessing the situation right now with wildfires tearing through southern california right now, the winds have been massive. they're they're not letting up. and this is a really tough one for firefighters. yeah. they were giving an update to the president as well as the governor talking about just how many acres we're talking about the eaton fire. that is the deadly fire that we do know of right now. that fire is 10,600 acres. right now. there are 755 firefighters in that particular fire working to try to put out those flames, battle the flames

as those winds continue to push on. we do know that arizona firefighters have made it into the state they are assisting right now with that 1000 personnel working right now. so you can just see the work going into trying to get this fire under control. and that's just one of three fires that is happening right now. of course, crews from northern california were sent to southern california as well to assist. they're trying as hard as they can. it's hard to make air drops at this point because the winds are so, so strong. we'll continue to follow what is going on in southern california. also coming up this midday, happening right here in the bay area, danielle louis is set to be sworn in as the next mayor of san francisco. coming up on nbc bay area, the busy day that he's already had ahead of today's inauguration. and we continue to look at those flames that are overwhelming southern california neighborhoods as blistering winds fueled multiple wildfires. we do have a live look at altadena. this is one of the places ravaged by those flames

right now. thousands are out of their homes right now, many of which firefighters are now in a desperate battle to save. we will continue this coverage straight ahead. and before we go to break football fans, nbc bay area is the place for you. this sunday, the commanders are set to take on the buccaneers in an all important wild card playoff matchup. coverage starts at 430 in the afternoon. stay with us.

in just moments. the inauguration ceremony for mayor daniel lurie will begin in san francisco. the streets around the civic center plaza. they are shut down as the swearing in will take place. nbc bay area's ginger conejero saab is live for us there for that ceremony. ginger. some of that rose parade some of them are like, hi, good morning, marcus and laura. you can feel civic center plaza energized. now we're just moments away, really minutes away from when daniel lowery's

inauguration is set to take place. take a look behind me. you can see the area really start to fill up. hundreds of guests, expected, ticketed guests expected and arriving, making their way to their seats. beyond those chairs is the stage where we can expect daniel lowery to take his oath of office. now, just a few steps away where we are. this is larkin street here. this has been closed off to traffic because it is open to the public. we are expecting more people to kind of gather, although there is a good number of people who have kind of taken time out of their morning to witness this inauguration. we're also expecting some vips to join the crowd, including jed york, larry baer, parker harris, jony ive, buster posey. state and local leaders like the board of supervisors and san francisco's political elite. now those those seats up front expected to start to really fill up before the mayor elect takes his oath just about less than five minutes from now at this point. now, it

has already been a busy morning for daniel lowery, which srted by handing out coffee at saint anthony's in the tenderloin this morning. lowery was joined by his wife, becca, and two children, tia and sawyer. they were personally greeting guests for roughly half an hour. then lowery walked the streets of the tenderloin. that is where he was joined by san francisco police chief bill scott, and together they walked and talked about talked about the city's most problematic areas. his energy is really, really high in terms of the vision and the what, what we need to accomplish. and keeping the momentum going is really important. it's hard not to have. and along the way, lowery stopped to meet with children and families living in the tenderloin. the mayor elect saying it was his own children's experience in san francisco that opened him up to running for office in the first place. what

they were seeing on the streets every single day was not explainable. you know, like it's to have people suffer. i mean, we were driving through the mission or walking through the mission, and it's still frustrating. we can do better. that is now lowery's love for san francisco permeating throughout his candidacy. and now as incoming mayor, he took san francisco's iconic cable cars this morning before getting hot chocolate with his family at ghirardelli square. the mor elect hoping that today is day one of turning things around in san francisco. now, after taking his oath, he is expected to address the crowd in his first address as mayor. you can imagine he will talk about the same issues that he ran on cleaning up streets, addressing the dr crisis here in the city, and pushing for accountability when it comes to our local leaders. now we're just hearing an announcement start. there it is, the

announcement that said that the program will begin momentarily. it is scheduled at 1130. it looks like things are going to run on time. we've got performances from glide ensemble, the san francisco gay men's chorus, and a reflection from steve kerr as part of the program. we'll continue our coverage here, but for now we're live in san francisco, ginger conejero saab nbc, bay area news. all right. exciting time in the city. thank you very much, ginger. now, we do continue to follow that breaking news for you out of southern california, where four major wildfires are carving a path to destruction. and one of those fires turned deadly. yes. we'll have more coming up on nbc bay area. we're going to have extended coverage. we know at least two people have died due to

(vo) with fargo, your virtual assistant from wells fargo, you can pick up the tab, even when you forget your wallet. (kaz) i got this. (ben) fargo, send kaz $145 dollars with zelle. (kaz) smooth. (vo) learn more at wellsfargo.com/getfargo. (♪♪) a single touch can say a thousand words. it says... i see you. i feel you. i got you. and i'm never letting go. (♪♪) ever. (♪♪) say it all with irresistibly touchable skin. get in touch. gold bond.

(vo) with fargo, your virtual assistant from wells fargo, you can pick up the tab, even when you forget your wallet. (kaz) i got this. (ben) fargo, send kaz $145 dollars with zelle. (kaz) smooth. (vo) learn more at wellsfargo.com/getfargo.