‘It’s hard to go to work when you’re worried your house might burn down.’ Flames flee fire-weary SoCal

Shortly after the Hughes Fire broke out, Deputy LA County Dist. He said. Jonathan Hatami said he ran out of the Antelope Valley Courthouse in Lancaster and back to Santa Clarita, where his children and hundreds of others were being evacuated from West Creek Academy as the sky darkened with smoke.

“You have other parents who are crying. You had little children … they were crying. You could see the smoke from the school, everyone stopped,” said Hatami, who has children aged 8 and 10.

The latest blaze has forced thousands of residents to flee, blocked a major north-south highway, threatened inmates at a large prison and is proving unsettling for firefighters and emergency workers who have been battling the flames in Southern California for weeks. While Hatami and his family did not have to evacuate, his wife, a Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy, was dispatched to the flames this afternoon.

A veteran prosecutor said his entire family was dealing with “fire fatigue” after spending more than two weeks waiting for wind-driven flames to threaten their home.

They are currently living in an area that warns people not to leave, but Hatami said he has packed bags waiting by the door.

“We are ready to see what can happen, we are ready to go,” he said. Pictures taken from Hatami’s yard show huge clouds of gray smoke rising in the distance, and he is horrified to think that his wife is even closer to the flames.

“Everyone is on edge. There is a lot. I love California. I love Los Angeles, but this is stressful,” she said. “It’s hard to go to work when you’re worried that your house might burn and your children are at school and your wife is outside, you don’t know what will happen to her.

The Hughes Fire quickly burned 5,000 acres and forced thousands to flee their homes during a month of the worst wildfire conditions to plague Southern California.

The Hughes Fire started on Lake Hughes Road just before 11 a.m. and immediately prompted evacuation orders in and around Lake Castaic, which by late afternoon had spread into Ventura County to the west and near Sandberg to the north. More than 19,000 people have been ordered to evacuate and another 14,000 people are under evacuation warnings.