fire is one of the most destructctive natural disastersn the history of los angeles. right on nbc bay area news

tonight. several wildfires in southern california are still raging. thousands of homes and businesses are gone, but how many more are at risk of burning? we're going to take you there live. plus, how did the fires actually start? we're joined by a retired arson captain on how to pinpoint the cause. and a notorious bay area kidnaper charged with new crimes. we're joined by the police chief who cracked the case by riding him in person. good evening. this is nbc bay area news tonight, and i'm jessica aguirre. tonight in los angeles, day three of an intense and deadly firefight. and another fire is now exploding in size. we're talking about the kenneth fire. it ignited in the west hills area of los angeles just this afternoon. and it, too, is fueled by the santa ana winds. it has exploded to more than 900 acres in just the past couple of hours. now, this is burning off of highway 101 near

the los angeles ventura county border. evacuations were ordered immediately, and we're learning that investigators are interviewing a possible person of interest connected to that fire and any possible connections to other fires. senator adam schiff is telling people they need to get out now. we keep seeing these fires pop up in different places. we may see more before this is over. if you're told to evacuate, then get the hell out. you might think you can outrun a fire. you are not going to outrun these fires. you are not going to outrun the fires. that is the truth. now the winds are still at red flag levels, but gusts have been less intense. firefighters are now using this opportunity to start working on containment lines for the eaton and the palisades fire. you can see those here right now. eaton fire, which is near pasadena. palisades fire right there. so far, neither has any containment. let's show you some aerials from above so you can

see just how extensive the damage is. now, you heard them say the palisades fire is already being called the most destructive fire ever to hit the city. cal fire estimates 5300 structures have been destroyed, and a second person has been found dead in that fire tonight. let's talk about the eaton fire, also believed to have destroyed 5000 structures. it's devastating all around there. the fire is burning in the altadena and pasadena area. it has grown to more than 13,000 acres. some people did get the opportunity to come home today to see if there's anything left of their neighborhood. just like seeing our home go down, our memories are just everything about it. it's yeah, we're hurting a lot. we would walk these streets all the time, and now seeing it burnt to the ground. and i'm just very blessed that my house is still standing. but we're not out of the woods yet. and my heart goes out to all the families i-5 friends who have lost their homes, two who've lost their

entire block. so i don't know how we recover. but yeah, that is the question. how do they even recover from this? and they're not out of the woods. we want to bring in nbc's jennifer bjorklund. she's live in altadena. and, jennifer, you've been on the ground now for a couple of days. tell us what the situation is now. it's very different here in altadena than it was yesterday when we spoke. and i was standing out in pacific palisades, where it is completely locked down. residents are not allowed in. they were allowing a few people in today with escorts, proof of residency and proof of need of medical equipment or prescription drugs or medicines that they had in their homes. if their homes were still standing, they were able to get in and get out. so they're doing that a little bit in the palisades. here in altadena, it's more of a patchwork there. there neighborhoods like the one i'm standing in where the homes are destroyed, absolute rubble. some have just the facade standing in

a fireplace but still smoldering gas jetting out and on fire from some sides of some of these homes. and then there will be a home that is absolutely untouched. you see dog walkers coming by, hugging their neighbors, some people back to pick up the pieces of what they can find in the rubble, and others finding their homes intact. so these, these, these neighborhoods are getting sort of back on their feet in an odd way, wondering how they're going to navigate the next year or the next few months, some of them thinking about just the next few days and not really realizing how much work really lies ahead to put their lives back together. but a very different scene here as they look beyond the fire that is still burning with no containment lines at this moment. yeah, these are difficult moments because there's so much, so many more steps ahead and just so many

different emotions going on and so many changes. it's going to be a really difficult year, year and a half for the folks there. thank you, jennifer, for all the work that you're doing for us. yeah. all right. i want to give you another look at the fires. let's show you the palisades fire. look at that. still burning, the sky still red. now we are told that there are hotspots going on. but what you're looking at right now, at least for this moment, is not near, homes. it's closer to the ridge line. the wind still an issue. now, we've been telling you that the gusts have died down a bit, but those gusts are going to pick up again. let's bring in our meteorologist, vianey arana, tracking the conditions. what are you seeing now and how much concern about the level of those winds going up? well, you know, the window for these winds going up is unfortunately going to be tonight into friday morning, which is the reason why that red flag warning got extended. and just to give you an overall view of some of the active fires that are burning when you start

seeing these erratic winds pick up, keep in mind how far an ember can travel. so let's take a look at some of the current conditions and the wind speeds we're monitoring. it's about 67 degrees. this is where the palisades fire is happening at nearly 20,000 acres. now also notice that humidity it's very dry 11% right now. wind gusts expected to pick up as we navigate this time stamp. i put it forward to about 8 a.m. a and u'll notice look at the wind speeds in these areas 50 to 60 plus mile per hour winds blowing from the north northeast. so anything really just south of that could be an issue here. as we look into the overnight hours, we're going to notice the winds pick up. but if we're looking for relief here, it's not until friday 7 p.m. that we start to see a break heading into friday and saturday before the winds pick up again on sunday. so another area for concern there, jess. yeah, these are going to be, you know, really nerve wracking the next couple of days with these winds coming back. thank you. all right. we're still in the middle of fighting these fires. we're still in the middle of evacuations. and we don't know what's going to happen next with

these fires. but the question is starting to emerge. how did the fire start? it is an important question that fire investigators are already trying to answer. now, no concrete cause has been pinpointed for any of the big fires, but the power company down there, socal edison, is examining its transmission lines by the fires that burned through altadena and sylmar. arson investigators, meanwhile, are out in the palisades fire burn zone looking for any sign of where that fire may have started. joining me now is john darmanin. he's a retired fire captain who led the arson task force for san francisco. thank you very much for being here. so let's begin at the beginning. where do arson investigators look? especially in an area like pacific palisades, which is decimated. i mean, what are the clues? well, thanks for having me, jessica. well, it's an analysis of a combination of the actual original fire report, the location of the initial reports,

eyewitnesses to pinpoint an area to start looking at physical evidence. it's time consuming, but arson investigators there were probably on the scene just after initial fire crews showed up to start their investigation. but many times, witnesses will point you in the right direction and you'll either prove or disprove what they have to say. looking at specific areas is important. you. you will look at physical evidence to determine if there was accelerants used. for example, it could be transmission line failures. there's so many different things that could have happened. lightning strikes, which is not the case h here, but with the fl load that is present there, it doesn't take much for a small fire to double in size literally every few seconds. wow. john, let me ask you another question

here. so that's really fascinating that the arson investigators get in right away. i thought you had to wait a little bit. now, i know that you were called in to help with the oakland hills fire when we had it here, the firestorm that we had in the 90s. but there seemed to be some parallels with the pacific palisades in terms of the location. hard to get in and out the wind, because that was the windstorm happened also in the oakland hills. and how quickly the fire spread. that's correct. again, the wind is the biggest enemy for a fire. it wind is created by the fire itself. but when you have natural wind going on as well, it just compounds the problem. this fire is not a surprise. i know the los angeles mayor bass said that this was historic. well, you know, it's not historic in the sense that it wasn't anticipated. measures have been mitigation measures

have been suggested and recommended for decades. some have been implemented slowly, some have been implemented immediately. but in recent years, a lot of these recommendations that cal fire and other fire experts have made have been ignored. john, let me ask you a question here. in terms that's kind of related to what you're talking about. one of the things that the firefighters have been saying is that they're running out of water is, i mean, how do you run out of water? have you seen that or heard about that before? well, yeah, i mean, in san francisco, that's a good example. i'm from san francisco, and in the 1906 quake, which everybody is aware of, was also the great conflagration and fire. and many of our fire hydrants didn't work for various reasons. and after that quake, san francisco paid for many, many mitigating measures, including building underground water systems, which is

basically a reservoir of water at strategic locations throughout the city. high pressure fire hydrants, which are unique to a few cities, but primarily in san francisco, as well as your traditional fire hydrants. we need water to fight fires. yeah, there are other things you do simultaneously, but without water, it's very difficult to control a fire. john, are you pretty confident that when all is said and done, the fire investigators very quickly will be able to figure out exactly how the fire started? well, there's it's not an exact science, but it is a science. and it's important to analyze all the physical evidence, not jump to conclusions. and believe it or not, witnesses in many cases will point you in the right direction, at least where to look. and even though it's an intense fire, evidence does remain and fire investigators have a limited knowledge of that

skill set. but arson investigators who are part of the fire department are trained in that investigation. and they they perform forensic analysis of all of the physical evidence. they know how fire works. and determining a point of origin is first on their list. that's fantastic. that's really fascinating. so much insight into what we needed to know about this. i'm sure we'll be talking to you more in the coming days. really good conversation. thank you. good coverage. thank you very much. all right. let's talk about that new fire near calabasas. it is just the latest struggle for firefighters. here's a look at it. now that's where we find our nbc bay area's velena jones. she joins us right now. we're in the west hills area of los angeles county, where that latest fire sparked. it's called victory trailhead, which is right up above is an area where people can go hiking, walking. it's full of vegetation, hills and trails in that area. that's where the fire first sparked up

on the ridge. and so there has been an immensemount of resources poured into this area because they don't want this fire to explode like the other fires have throughout la. and so right now, what you're seeing is a lot of different resources from l.a. county and other neighboring communities here. and when this all started, the fire sparked on top of the ridge. we saw a lot of crews go up there and bring water onto the hillside. we saw a lot of air support coming from up above. and in fact, one police officer told us that there were at least two people in the trailhead at the time that that fire started. and when the fire retardant came down, it came down right on them. ems had to check those two individuals out, but thankfully tonight the wind

is shifting this fire away from this community. you can see where we are is at the top of a hill that surrounded by homes. and so the concern here tonight was because this fire was so close to these h homes thahat te fire would jump over and we would see more homes be lost. that's what they didn't want to have happen. there were mandatory evacuations here in this area. those have since been lifted. but there still are evacuation orders in place to the south of us towards ventura. that is where the fire is moving. reporting for nbc bay area in l.a. county. velena jones, back to you. okay. thank you very much. velena. stay safe. up next, you remember this guy. remember he was convicted of that notorious bay area kidnaping? well, now he's being tied to other crimes. we're joined by the seaside police chief, who is credited with cracking this case wid

now being charged with more crimes, and it is in part thanks to a police chief from the monterey bay. matthew mueller was convicted of raping and kidnaping denise huskins quinn and then tying up her now husband, aaron quinn, in vallejo nearly a decade ago. this case made international headlines, in part because vallejo pd

originally called it a hoax. they said the couple made it up. now. the crime got fresh interest last year after netflix aired its documentary series american nightmare. seaside police officer police chief. i should say nick borges watched the show and then decided to write to mueller in prison. and surprisingly, mueller wrote back. the chief says mueller gave him critical info, tying him to at least four other crimes. those crimes include a rape and kidnaping from 1993 when mueller was 16 years old, two home invasions in santa clara county in 2015, and another previously unreported ransom case that happened two weeks after the former marine and harvard educated attorney kidnaped huskins quinn. joining me now is seaside police chief nick borges. so i if this case wasn't gripping before all of this. i mean, you brought this thing up several notches. you watched this netflix documentary, and then you meet

denise huskins, right? and then you decide that you're just going to write to mueller and see what happens next. yeah. pretty much. i mean, i met denise and aaron. this is a case i've been following for many years. i've been a cop for 22 years, and this happened in california. so this was something that i was always very intrigued by. and i, i watched the series on netflix back in january, and i just felt compelled being a law enforcement leader now as a police chief, to reach out to this couple, they went through just a horrifying situation, both with mueller and with law enforcement. and i just wanted them to know that i always believed them, that i support them. i'm behind them, and there's others in law enforcement that feel the same. and i was really shocked to even get a response back from denise and aaron. and from there, things kind of went off and i was able to meet misty caruso from the alameda county sheriff's office. we had a seminar. we turned this really low level training into a statewide training with over 300

law enforcement officials. there we met vern pierson, the el dorado d.a. and really, from there, back in march of last year, we formed a team. and i always noticed when it came to denise and aaron, they never referred to their inciden with just singular. they never referred to it as just mueller. they always talked about the kidnapers them, they. and that got me really interested in wanting to know if they felt there was more people involved. and they certainly did. and there were some things that never went public and still have not gone public that are very suspicious. and i felt in law enforcement i was obligated not only just to say sorry to them, but to try and help. chief, tell me a little bit about when you went because you went to prison and you met mueller. how did you get him? just to give you all this information, it seems like he wanted to get it off his chest. or. or was he bragging? i mean, what was that development like? well, i actually have not gone to prison to, to meet with him. the el dorado da, vern pierson, who's part of our team,

he partnered with the fbi. they went to the prison last month and had a detailed interview with him. and that really was based upon these letters. and i have to say these letters, i was given permission and authority by denise and aaron. it was them. they're really the heroes in this situation. they are the flame that lit this. they're the ones that should be credited. i merely facilitated and wrote letters. but i was really surprised. my intent when i wrote letters was to ask mr. mueller whether or not any other people were involved, and i didn't use any trickery. i didn't use any science based training. i was authentic, i was a human. i identified myself as a police chief. i even used my letterhead. and after a letter or two, i was just shocked. i was in my office and these letters come back with these confessions, essentially, and i didn't know the facts specific to each case, but they were extremely detailed. and at that point, i knew that i had to alert authorities. and i contacted the police chief in palo alto and the police chief

in mountain view, and they were fantastic. they immediately formed a team between both agencies and began working with me on these letters and passing information back and forth. and he mentioned in the letter the now san ramon case that was referenced in there, although he gave the wrong county, but he referenced very minor details. but on the other two santa clara county cases, i just knew when i was reading this that if these facts match evidence, this is a confession. and it was it was pretty mind blowing. you really blew that case wide open. thank you so much for speaking to us today,nd also for stepping a u

clear conditions tonight. just the warmth of today will eventually decrease and we're going to get a chilly overnight lows. but let's get right to your microclimate forecast so we can talk about where those temperatures stand right now and where they're headed. we've got 50s and 60s on the map. notice san jose 63 degrees. san francisco is at about 62. we did manage to climb into the 70s today. we can expect to see similar conditions for tomorrow. here's what it looks like on satellite radar. conditions have been calm thas to this high pressure. we've seen those clearing skies and the warmer temps. so what can we expect for tomorrow? well, because it's going to be clear tonight, we're going to wake up to some chilly 30s and 40s for tomorrow. and we can expect to see those afternoon highs heading into

those 60s as well as we get into that weekend forecast, which is going to set us up for lots of sunshine ahead. you're noticing your san francisco 7-day forecast. we're going to remain in those 60s for the weekend. and if you look at the icons over the next seven days, we have no rain in the forecast, at least not in this extended outlook for the next seven days, inland temperatures are also going to max out in those 60s. and notice the overnight lows do start to get even chillier heading into next week, with a couple of 40s and 30s expected into the mning. cold in the morning, but lots of sun. all right. thank you. vianey that's going to do it for us here at 7:00. hope you enjoy your dinner. we'll see you back here at 11 with all the latest from southern california. thank you.

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