Ask Dr. Drew - My Pasadena Home Is Surrounded By CA’s Eaton Wildfires w/ OC Fire Chief Brian Fennessy & John Phillips – Ask Dr. Drew - Ep 442

Episode Date: January 12, 2025

Dr. Drew lives in Pasadena, CA, which is currently surrounded by massive wildfires. This is a special breaking news broadcast covering the nearby Pacific Palisades & Eaton wildfires, with Orange County Fire Chief Brian Fennessy, John Phillips, and more SoCal residents. [Broadcast LIVE on January 8, 2025] Brian Fennessy is Fire Chief of Orange County in California. Previously Chief of San Diego Fire-Rescue Department (2015-2018), he established their helicopter program and served there since 1990. His career began in 1978 with federal agencies, advancing from hotshot crew to superintendent. Fennessy chairs FIRESCOPE and the California Metropolitan Fire Chiefs Association, holds a business administration degree, and specializes in fire/rescue/EMS operations. Find more at https://ocfa.org/ Orange County native John Phillips is the host of The John Phillips Show, airing Monday – Friday from 12-3pm. Listen at https://www.kabc.com/johnphillips-2/ and follow him at https://x.com/Johnnydontlike 「 SUPPORT OUR SPONSORS 」 Find out more about the brands that make this show possible and get special discounts on Dr. Drew's favorite products at https://drdrew.com/sponsors  • FATTY15 – The future of essential fatty acids is here! Strengthen your cells against age-related breakdown with Fatty15. Get 15% off a 90-day Starter Kit Subscription at https://drdrew.com/fatty15 • PALEOVALLEY - "Paleovalley has a wide variety of extraordinary products that are both healthful and delicious,” says Dr. Drew. "I am a huge fan of this brand and know you'll love it too!” Get 15% off your first order at https://drdrew.com/paleovalley • THE WELLNESS COMPANY - Counteract harmful spike proteins with TWC's Signature Series Spike Support Formula containing nattokinase and selenium. Learn more about TWC's supplements at https://twc.health/drew 「 MEDICAL NOTE 」 Portions of this program may examine countervailing views on important medical issues. Always consult your physician before making any decisions about your health. 「 ABOUT THE SHOW 」 Ask Dr. Drew is produced by Kaleb Nation (https://kalebnation.com) and Susan Pinsky (https://twitter.com/firstladyoflove). This show is for entertainment and/or informational purposes only, and is not a substitute for medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

So in the intervening time, since I was on noon and this now 3 o'clock Pacific time stream, I went out and drove with my son up into the fires here locally. So we sit near the Rose Bowl in Pasadena. Now, I think people know the fires were in Malibu and the Palisades, which is about 30 miles from here, something like that. Take us an hour and a half to drive there. Nowhere near where we are. No smoke, no nothing from that one.

But a new fire broke out in Eaton Canyon, which is exactly where the fire broke out in the 90s that was so devastating. I think they called it the Altaloma Fire then. Maybe somebody looked that up for me. And by the way, and so there is now smoke here where we live because there's the fire surrounding us. And so my nose, my chest, everything, ashes all over the place.

It's snowing ashes. And in fact, when you look out the window of our house, I mean, the smoke is, it looks like a very cloudy day. Kind of orange. An orangey color. Remember when this fire was from, was it in Canada? The smoke descended out of New York City and you had that sort of orange cast and everything. We have that here.

But it's hard to breathe. It messes with your nose and everything. It's nasty. And one of the interesting things I want to point out is I think it's about five years of no gas-powered vehicles are the equivalent of what just went into the air here in Southern California.

We've completely, whatever CO2 we are worried about putting into the atmosphere in California, we have completely undone anything we could possibly do by allowing these fires to occur. So one of the questions I want to ask the fire chief is, is this all preventable? And if it was preventable,

why it wasn't prevented? So anyway, we drove up into the fire zone, the nearest one to us. Two areas are broken out here near us within the Eden fire. Eden Canyon fire is probably about 10 miles from us, something like that. And it jumped over into Altadena, which is the next city over to Pasadena. It's north up towards the foothills, where when things get into the foothills, it gets bad. That's when things really move along. But it usually blows up into the foothills and away from the residential area. We drove up into it. You get up right into it. Caleb, I think you have some pictures that I took up there in the

fire. There were some homes destroyed. There were some businesses threatened. And it was very difficult to breathe up there. It was really kind of nasty. So when I came back down here, it was still bothering me. So the point being is that this is still a long way from us. Conservatively, if the wind were blowing hard, there's zero wind now, and everything's been cleaned up here locally in terms of trees down and that sort of thing.

There is zero wind. If the wind were blowing hard like it was yesterday or the day before, I would have some concerns about this. But with no wind, the fire would have to move through conservatively about 1,000 buildings and jump across a riverbed through the Rose Bowl, across the Rose Bowl parking lot, and go back up the hill where we are to get to us. So it is a long way from us. It's almost unthinkable that it could get here. However, I'm hearing that the reservoir management and water management in this part of the world is so shitty

that there apparently is no water in Altadena to fight the fires. And thus far, I've seen no air support. We were up there and we saw no planes, no helicopters, none of the usual things that we see fighting fires. So I don't know if they're just going to let this one burn out or what their plan is. That's where we were. No, no, that's not us. That's up in the Eden Canyon area.

Ellie Barsh sent that? She's in Hollywood. Yeah, this is a photo that she has from up there. The clouds. So she's looking at our smoke all the way over to Hollywood. Yeah, the smoke has been intense. Uncannily so. It was dark until like 10 a.m. Yeah, we noticed, my son and I

noticed when we drove back. That's my backyard. That's our smoke, yeah. that this this smoke in the morning and there was like no light yeah there's something about this smoke that it hangs heavy over canyons okay that's where we went that's the one of the houses we said we drove right up to that and uh the next picture is the sort of business district that is about a block away that's that and you can see the fire moving into that area and they had that all blocked off and then we drove back down it took us almost 15 minutes to drive home on the freeway you know it's a long way away but this smoke we noticed was hanging in over the rose bowl and over the canyon where we are here in the back and it was odd it was just so odd i don't know if there's something about this smoke that now that's the pacific palisades and malibu fire um well no this one's lax that right but that's pointed at the because i was there last night and that's what

it looked like when you're flying that's what that's what it looked like just like that and it didn't look that big frankly from the air the air compared to... He was in a plane during the whole thing. Yeah, I've flown in over many fires in this region. It was so windy. And some of the fires are humongous. This is not huge. It's just in a terrible region. It's in a highly populated region,

and that's why this has gotten so much trouble associated with him. But I'm wondering if you have the video I sent you. Yeah, I have all of the videos prepared, but for some reason it's just, it won't let me play any videos. So I'm sticking with photos for now because I want to stay streaming. I don't know.

It's because we're doing two shows in a day and who knows? Who knows? All right. So what I sent was some video of, I think Corolla posted it on X, of the ocean side of Malibu, where there are multiple 10, even $20 million homes

that are just gone. Paulina sent that. One of her friends took it. Yeah, and they're just gone. And what I want to say about that is just two days before, was it yesterday maybe? Adam was talking about that is just two days before, was it yesterday maybe, Adam was talking about how the winds were kicking up, and he said, you know, I look down Pacific Coast Highway,

and all I see are wooden power poles covered in creosote that have been hammered into the ground in like 1890. Like those are the same holes that were there when Malibu was first founded. And the power lines drooping between the big telephone poles, so to speak, the big power poles, the big essentially pine tree trunks. And those are the same power lines that were there in 1890 or 1910. And he was saying at the time, he goes, we know the winds kick up.

We know this is a fire zone. This has some of the most expensive property on earth. Why aren't they burying these power lines, at least in regions where it can cause so much damage and fire? Nope, nope, of course not. The other thing, and something he has been screaming about for quite some time, is in that same region of Pacific Coast Highway for about, I guess about seven or eight miles,

there are broken down campers. I'm too bad you can't play these videos. People wouldn't believe it. Next to the $10 million houses are these broken down campers. Now, what most people don't know that I have been told is those campers are managed by the local LA gangs. And they take the disability checks from the homeless people. Oh, here it is is this is what corolla uh this is of um yeah this is corolla's uh hood this is where his he's got a condo there and oh i'm not sure this is his video because this looks like it's up the hill a little ways that's pauline's friend

okay this is not still this is the palisades but This is the Palisades. Everything's gone. But this is the Palisades. No, it's Malibu. I'm not sure. But in any event, these homeless campers are all power. Is that the beach club? That's the beach club. Yeah. That's weird. Still standing. Are all powered and people make their food by butane tanks that are open to air and are not nothing about these campers are up to fire code.

They are fire hazards and they sit there all on Pacific Coast. And when the wind kicks up, they're going to cause a fire. And again, they are managed by the gangs and they are given over to the gangs the disability checks of the homeless, which is an insanity that we allow. And you see now the campers are all gone. I don't know if they burned down or they moved them out or whatever. So John Phillips joins me. He, again, can be followed on X. Johnny don't like Joe. John, how are you, buddy? Good to see you. Which department are you with? Which department am I with?

No, this is Drew here. This is... I'm from Orange County originally, from Garden Grove. Oh, wait. So the fire chief is not here yet. He's not here yet. That's why. He's also here. He's also here.

Here he comes. Well, I'm going to talk to John first. Hold on. I'm going to talk to John first. John on, I'm going to talk to John first. John, this is Drew. Do you know that you're on the stream now. Do you know that all those campers, those broken down campers that people cook,

you're streaming right now. I was saying, do you know all those broken down campers that are all along Pacific Coast Highway in Malibu, right? Yeah. Okay. They are all not up to fire code. They all have butane tanks. They cook on the butane.

Wind kicks up. Those are a really serious hazard. Are you aware that most of those, my understanding is, are run by the local LA gangs and they require the homeless to hand over their disability checks to them to stay in those campers? No. I've heard that. have any idea why some of the most costly real estate on the planet is powered by power lines, which are on poles, like essentially pine poles that were hammered in place in about 1890, as opposed to being buried in the ground where they should be? And are they allowed to remain a fire hazard and may have been what triggered this fire?

Who's responsible for that? I don't know, but I can tell you this. In my neighborhood, and it's purely because they don't want them to obstruct the view of the mountains, they're not allowed to be above ground. Everything is below ground. Interesting. mountains they're not allowed to be above ground everything is is below ground interesting and do you have any opinion about the lack of water to fight these fires i know in altadena which is a fire near where i'm sitting right now they've said no no water i know the

palisades has trouble getting water on the fire hydrants uh there's a trump up here a trump ex post up here about no water. Do you have any sense of how that happened? Well, it's the government not working. I mean, we learned in Lahaina that if you don't have access to water, how dangerous that can be. I mean, we saw what happened to those poor people whose homes were burned down, the businesses were burned down. And you would assume that that would be something that they would check and they would make sure is certainly filled with water, particularly in areas that are prone to fires. But that just was not done this time. I mean, Rick Caruso, who is a candidate, former candidate for mayor,

a certainly prominent businessman here in Los Angeles, said flat out there was no water in Pacific Palisades. He is the source of that story. And that seems to be something that is being repeated by other homeowners in that area. And it's just totally unacceptable, especially when you have money as a government to spend on different drug paraphernalia to give to drug addicts in MacArthur Park, and you have money for health insurance for illegal immigrants and everything else under the sun,

but you don't have money to put water in the fire hydrants. That's what government is supposed to do, is to protect you with police and fire and roads and those sorts of things. And boy, did they drop the ball. Well, you mentioned roads. I've been, you know, this whole road diet phenomenon that's been underway for the last almost 10 years

has had me gravely concerned in terms of emergency responsiveness. You see that big pile up that got stuck trying to leave the Palisades yesterday? It made me wonder if that had something to do with the road diets where emergency vehicles can't get in and out. I forget the fact that the roads don't work. They don't work, but that emergency vehicles can't even get in and out. Yeah, and that's one of the reasons why it's probably a good idea, if you can, to work from home. Just stay out of the way. Let the emergency responders have access to the roads so they can get to wherever it is they need to go.

But people were just leaving their cars right there on the road. And what they were having to do is get bulldozers to move the cars out of the way so the fire trucks could get to where they were supposed to be going. Yep. Yep. And it just made me think about some of the situations I'd seen on Adams Boulevard in West Los Angeles,

I guess that's Los Angeles proper, where ambulances are trying to get through because there are two huge bike lanes that I've never seen a single bicycle in. I've never seen one bicycle in those lanes. And ambulances can't get through because the traffic

is so held up. Caleb, what are you showing us? Oh, this is the bulldozers going in there and moving the cars out. So we're showing videos of that, John. The people panicked. What I had read is that they panicked. They got stuck in traffic and then they saw the fires coming up too close, panicked and just left the cars. And then really the city has no choice but to bulldoze them out of the way now.

I would argue that that wasn't panic. What I read is that- They were running from their cars. No, no, not running. They were there for hours and couldn't get anywhere. They just gave up. They weren't get anywhere. They just gave up. They weren't running away. They just were like,

we got to do something else. So they abandoned the cars and walked somewhere else. So crazy. Yeah. So did the fire chief show up yet? Yes, he's here. Oh, good.

But let me bring the fire chief in. It is Brian Fennessy. He's the fire chief for Orange County. As I said, I gave, Brian, I gave all your particulars before you got here. I appreciate you being here very much. did you hear some of the things we were

talking about and our concerns about really what could have been done to forget the response about the response i just my heart goes out to the victims and the firefighters and everybody's trying to manage this thing but my concern is the things that could have prevented this in the first place no i i did and you know i he asked some really good questions you know the the in terms the things that could have prevented this in the first place? No, I did. And, you know, you asked some really good questions, you know, in terms of the, you know, power lines and whatnot. I know that the utilities up and down the state are working towards undergrounding them. But you ask a good question.

I have no idea why you've got to ground, you know, power lines down along PCH there. But, you know, a good question for Edison. I'm assuming it's a Southern California Edison thing. I mean, I'm not in that business, so I don't know. I don't know what the fire start was. I think it's still under investigation. So I don't know if it's utility or homeless encampment or, I mean, who knows what.

I will tell you, though. Brian, let me, before you comment, I just want to say that I have a friend that runs a lot of the air response to the fire here and all over the hemisphere, frankly. And he said that pretty much all the fires are caused by homelessness and power lines. And that's it. That's who causes our fire. Would that be accurate, pretty much? No, no, that's not accurate. I mean, there's a percentage. And I know if I'd have known this question was coming, I would have got that for you.

But no, there is a percentage, obviously, of each. But, you know, certainly it wasn't lightning, right? We know it wasn't lightning. So could it be human or something else? And utilities there, but it's not as great as you'd think it was. But, you know, on the water side, because I get that a lot, too. Right. We get a lot of fires, obviously, here in Orange County. And I was the fire chief for the city of San Diego before I was here. And what happens in these fires, and I've been doing this for 47 years, since 1978, started with the Forest Service in the L.A. area and been to a lot of these Santa Ana wind driven fires over many decades.

And what a lot of people don't realize is that, you know, the pressure, you know, for our hydrants, for your waters at home is all through, you know, a pump system. And you won't you won't they're not really obvious where these pump stations are. In fact, I was up in Altadena this morning, and there was one on fire, and the person who was with me was like, what is that? I was like, well, that's a pump station. It looks like an outbuilding of some sort. But once those pump stations burn up and go down, there's no more water pressure. And in these big fires, it's not uncommon. I know 20 years ago during the big firestorms of 2003 and 2007, there was a lot of attention on the lack of water pressure for not just firefighters, but the communities. And, you know, there's obviously some Homeland Security concerns

about making that information public. Well, we had to petition and really work to get the information on where those were because we need to protect those. I mean, those are as valuable potentially as a home would be because once those pump stations are out, man, you're not getting any more water than what you showed up with. And the 500 gallons showing up with, you know, usually is not going to be enough when you've got a structure fire, you know, like we're seeing up there. But I'll end with this. Again, after seeing all these, what we, certainly what I saw this morning, I spent about five, six hours in Altadena from, you know, before daylight through about noon. I'll use the word historic. I've seen a lot of

wind-driven fires, and I can't remember one that had the wind velocity that was experienced over Southern California. There was one in 1980 when Ontario Airport recorded a 100-mile-an-hour gust or whatever. Well, that was happening throughout the region. And having grown up in Altadena, that's why I was up there, it's not uncommon to have very strong sand and winds. This was extraordinary. And I don't think they've placed a structure loss count yet. But if somebody told me today that there was 2,000, 3,000 homes lost in Altadena, that would not surprise me. It might be even more than that. The devastation is absolutely dumbfounding.

Wow, that is awful to hear. We're about four miles away from the eastern edge of the Altadena fire as the crow flies here. I drove up there a few minutes ago and I didn't see any air support and I also didn't see any water. So I'm wondering, do you know what their plan is? They just have to let it burn out or what are they doing? No, I don't know what their plan is because I have not attended any of their planning meetings or anything like that. We here in Orange County have lots of resources, both in Pacific Palisades and in Altadena. We've sent our aircraft out.

We've got our hand crews up there, our bulldozers. We've got a lot of equipment on both fires for the mutual aid system. This time of year, if you're relying on federal contracted helicopters, they're all off contract right now. You've got agency aircraft. And when I say that, I'm talking about CAL FIRE, L.A. County, Orange County, L.A. City. But there's limits to that.

The air tanker fleet also, at least on the federal side, is not as robust, nearly as robust as it is during quote-unquote the traditional fire season. I will tell you that they flew a lot yesterday during the day. The plan was to fly last night. We operate a night program. We'll work with LA County extensively, but the wind velocity was so high that a there were safety concerns and quite frankly when the wind is blowing that that strong the minute you release the retardant or the water it blows to the pacific ocean it does not it does not make the target um but i would expect there to be a very robust air response uh today but again i can't comment on because i don't know what they have uh out there um the other thing is i'm wondering what they're so there's the eaton fire and there's the altadena

fire they're sort of kind of different they're both sort of in the altadena area and it feels like they're kind of coming they're getting close to each other uh in terms of the Eaton moving west and the Altadena one moving east. I worry if that happens. That, to me, looks like the worst-case scenario because then it starts heading down into real heavy business and more populated areas. Well, I do know that you know that the eaton fire is the one in altadena and then there's the uh fire out of silmar like you said i think that's the one we're talking about they're both kind of converging lock and yada no no it's it's it's it's it's a little different because i just drove up into it it's it's there's

an this bike goes the the altadena fire goes essentially to JPL. It's right there at JPL. But the eastern edge is way over almost to Monrovia. And those are the two parts that are kind of coming together. Yeah. I did not know that. I drove up, you're familiar with the area, up into Eaton Canyon from the 210 freeway today.

So you may be absolutely right. I don't know. But you're right. I mean, it's largely less a wildland or wildfire and more now an urban conflict. That's right. That's right. That's what makes this one different. Because I flew in last night into LAX and I thought, wow, this fire is not that big, but the location is just awful. It's just the wrong spot. And the wind was just taking it right through. Oh, my gosh. It's, you know, last night, like I say, I have family still up in Altadena and friends.

And I was getting calls last night saying, hey, am I in danger here at this fire? I told them, man, you're out of your mind. That fire will never reach you. Will never reach you. I mean, you were so far away from the hillside. Three in the morning, I'm getting calls from him going, hey, the fire is across the street. And I couldn't get my mind. Oh my God. But I've never seen fire travel into a community as deep as it has on this eating fire. And yeah, you looked looked at least when the sun came up this morning or became daylight you'd look to the mountains right the foothills there there wasn't a lot of smoke you could tell there was a fire all the smoke was in the community i mean were

the dozens of homes that were were burning yeah yeah just incredible just incredible Yeah. Yeah. Just incredible. Just incredible. So, Chief, we're for us, we're staying put because it looks to me like for us to get over here, we're on the other side of the Arroyo across from the you'd have to you'd have to get through the Rose Bowl parking lot to get to us. Is it reasonable for us to stay here? Yeah, I think so. You know, when I drove and I went to John Muir High School, so I'm really familiar with the area that you're talking about. And with the winds really subsiding as they have, they're not done, but even in the time I was there from about 7 in the morning, 6 in the morning, whatever it was until about when I headed back south in noon, the wind had really tapered off.

It was still strong. There's nothing now. It's still now in this area. So right now, just FYI, right now, I'm going to let John in here to see if he has any questions for you in a second, but it's still right now. And I drove up Lincoln

past John Muir because it looked like the fire was right there at the high school. It is not. It's way up Lincoln a ways. But it's starting to threaten those businesses there on sort of Montana and that area. I agree. I mean, even Lake, you know where Lake is. I couldn't believe that Elliott, you know, junior, higher, middle school, whatever they call it now, was on fire.

I mean, there was fire all the way down to New York Drive. And so to me, it was just shocking. And these are businesses, commercial businesses, as well as residential structures. But to your question, Dr. Drew, yeah, I truly, I'd feel pretty comfortable based on the area that you're talking about. You know, the thing with these fires is, and maybe you don't hear it very often, there's not a lot that we, the fire service, can do when the winds are blowing like this. We can get people out of the way. We can get behind where the wind's blowing, try to hurt it.

But until that wind stops, we could could have a thousand two thousand fire engines there and it's not going to make a significant difference until that winds you know uh starts to to calm and we can get in there and do work and it's that's what i figured just mother nature i want to bring john nature mother nature owned us the last couple days yeah yeah i get i get it and then with as always nature wins john do you have any questions for the chief or any comments what Mother Nature owned us the last couple of days. Yeah, yeah, I get it. And as always, nature wins. John, do you have any questions for the chief or any comments on what we just talked about? Well, I'll tell you this.

Right now, when I was on the radio, we were getting calls from people who are worried about what's going to happen with the whole insurance situation here in California. The woman who runs the fair plan, which is the plan of last resort, and many banks require you if you're making payments on your house to provide proof of insurance, the fair plan is the plan of last resort. That's where a lot of people in fire

prone areas, like the areas that just burn down where they purchase their homeowner's insurance. The woman who runs the fair plan went in front of the legislature recently and said that they were one major fire away from going bankrupt. This fire is the largest fire in the history of Los Angeles County. And the area that it hit, it's a densely populated area where the homes are worth a fortune. I would imagine this is going to be billions and billions and billions of dollars in damage. I spoke with the Assembly Republican leader, James Gallagher, earlier today, who said that he believes that this is going to knock the fair plan into bankruptcy. Do you have

any thoughts on that? You know, I'm familiar with the fair plan only because we hear a lot about it, right, is the fire service. And we've been kind of pulled into the matter in a variety of different ways. You know, you've got the fire hazard severity zones that we determine the fire service and where, well, the insurance companies use a whole nother method that we're not familiar with to determine risk versus hazard. And you get into this debate with them, what is risk versus hazard? And quite frankly, I'm not the brightest guy in the world. To me, they're the same, right? I mean, it's the same thing. And, you know, I have friends, of course, and colleagues that are paying a fortune for their insurance through this fair plan, as you say.

And I would not be at all surprised if what you heard was accurate. There are people that just can't afford this insurance if you're on a fixed income and retired and those sorts of things. And I think where we get caught up in this a little bit is many of these properties we don't believe maybe are as at risk as perhaps the insurance companies say they are. But we're not included in the conversation. And the fire service nationally and certainly statewide is working their way into those conversations now. I've stood there next to people, next to developers, and I said, do you see this as a concern, you know, a fire hazard concern? And there's been times where I've said, no,

you've done everything that we've asked you to do. You've done the defensible space. You've got the, everything is accurate. Well, you know, we can't get insurance, you know, for this place. And I just scratch my head. I mean, we are the experts, right? We know where the Santa Ana corridors are, where the Canyon corridors are. The insurance company doesn't ask us.

They've got their own methodology. And we don't necessarily agree with everything that they've come up with. Brian, as a physician dealing with health care insurance all the time, it's a very familiar feeling. They're not concerned with our opinion at all. They pretend to be. They're not concerned with it. John, I wonder, I want you both to kind of put your, speculate for me.

Do you imagine, John, this is going to upend politics or finance in the state of California, the county of Los Angeles? Well, this highlights a number of failures of state and local government. I mean, take the insurance issue, for example. When the fair plan goes

bankrupt, the response is to shift the bill to the insurance companies. Well, they're leaving the state as it is before you put this bill on their doorstep. If we become uninsurable as a state, that's not going to be a good look for Gavin Newsom. The other thing that he did that I think is a big mistake is he politicized this immediately. He took the issue and said, oh, Joe Biden's been so fantastic. He's given me everything that we want. Now that Donald Trump, as soon as he takes over, everything's going to be political and we're going to have to go kiss his ring and we shouldn't have to do that. And then in the next breath, he goes, but we shouldn't politicize this. Well, you just did. You just took the issue and you made it highly political. And if you're Gavin Newsom, everything that you do, everything that you say is through the prism of not help you as a candidate for the presidency, but what that

leaves the people of California is an absentee landlord as governor. And we need people who are engaged in this because we have a number of crises going on right now. Our mayor at the time, Karen Bass, was in Africa. She was not here in Los Angeles leading the city through this. She was apparently warned days ago that there were extreme winds and there was the potential for fire danger. And she made the choice to stay in Africa because she wanted to go to the inauguration for the president there. Well, fine. When disaster strikes, there's no mayor to run the city of Los Angeles. You're on an airplane. And it highlights a lot of the problems that we deal with right now with local government, where we have people who think that they're not going to lose re-election, and they're disengaged, and they're not providing the service that we need for the nuts and bolts of running our government.

Ryan, should we be taking aim at our local officials of course there has to be some accountability but uh I is it fair to really hold their hand to the fire you know that's a great question and and you know given the position I'm in you know as a fire chief I don't know that it would be prudent or responsible for me to speculate because I really don't know. However, if you talk to people that do know me, I'm big on accountability. Again, I can't speak to the mayor, the governor, the president, whatever the thing is.

I just don't know. I'm not well versed in that and and really have to remain apolitical it is though i know john john but john's business is to be political so i'll lean on him a little bit is that is that is that uh you certainly you certainly feel angry you know it feels like this was avoidable in so many ways. Before I go to John, Brian, let me ask you this. When I was in high school here, and when you were growing up in Altadena, you look up in those San Gabriel Mountains, and all you saw was fire breaks crisscrossing everywhere,

all over the place, and all kinds of fire and forestry and fire management before the fires. I remember when that got interfered with at the beginning and then got completely undermined. But the first move was it's interfering with a field mouse migratory pattern. And that was the end of the fire breaks. And you agree with me that the forestry management and the fire breaks must be instituted in terms of prevention if we're going to deal with this issue. Well, I do agree with a lot. And you're right.

I remember that very clearly as well. I mean, we had not just fuel breaks, but actual fire breaks and when i i started in 1978 with the u.s forest service at with the oak grove hot shots right there next to la canada high school there was a hot shot crew there it was about 18 years old and i spent 13 years uh with the u.s forest service and bureau land management much of that early time spending time on those fuel breaks you know after fire season cutting out fuel breaks, piling, burning, all those. And I mentioned that all that we used to spray herbicides, you know, on the fuel breaks back when you could. How dare you? Oh my goodness. Oh, sacrilege.

Using products that you can't use today. And they were very effective. And I don't know anything about the field mouse. I mean, I think as a young, you know, firefighter, you know, everything was tied around budget. And if there wasn't budget to have, so in the summer, I spent time on a fire crew and a hot shot crew. And then the winter, I had an opportunity to work on a fuel screw and they'd fly us up to the fuel breaks or whatever. We maintained the fuel break network that you're talking about in the front country of the Angeles National Forest. And over time, that management started to cease. Why? I don't know. I assumed it was budgetary. I don't know about the environmental piece of it. I looked it up. I looked it up. Primary environmental. Primary. Well, there's a lot of that, right?

In Northern California, look at the logging industry. You know, the spotted owl and all these other things. And, you know, the Forest Service used to be a resource agency. They will tell you they still are. But, again, they've become a fire agency. And there's a number of things that are going on, some of them very public. And I've been on my soapbox a bit. They're not paying and benefiting their firefighters

and they're leaving in droves. Well, who has to make that up? Local government and CAL FIRE. And we've been trying to publicly put pressure on the Washington office of the Forest Service to do something about that. So I don't want to chase that rabbit because your question's a good one. Yes, we need to be putting fire on the landscape.

We need to be doing what we can because we've got a very unhealthy situation with our national forests and our open spaces. So John, I'll let you sort of spout the political position and then I'll let you go. I know you've got a heart out, but I've had it for a minute here. Well, go back to the issue of the availability of water for a second. We passed a water bond in California in 2014.

And originally it was going to be for $11 billion and was negotiated by Schwarzenegger. It ended up around $7 billion. And it was very similar to what happened with the infrastructure bill in Washington under Joe Biden. And that is, you call it infrastructure, and you think it's going to go to the airports and the ports and the roads and rail and all of those things. And in reality, it goes to anything they wanted to spend the money on. And they just called it infrastructure. That water bond was a vehicle for pork, where then Speaker of the Assembly Karen Bass put in money for a park because that would benefit her constituents in her district. There was a $250

million bailout for billionaire Warren Buffett that was written in there. And the fact of the matter is, is that reservoirs and things like that, trapping and keeping water that people thought that they were voting for when they voted for a water bond, was really not the impetus for the water bond. And many of these reservoirs that needed to be built or needed to be maintained so that we have access to water, not just for fighting fires, but for consumption and for crops and those sorts of things. They just never got built because everything got gummed up in the process of going through the various regulatory agencies to get

approval. Everything was essentially slow walk. And now we don't have the water that we need. And I would add that, what, two years ago, we had those huge downpours in Northern California in places like San Francisco and Sacramento and those areas where we could have trapped that water, we could be using that water, we could have access to that water, and we just don't because for whatever reason

in the state of California, whether it's high-speed rail or water bonds, we don't spend the money in ways that benefit the people who are paying the bills. Things just take forever or they just never get completed altogether. And most of the time, it's just like, okay, well, there's no high-speed rail. Let's fly southwest. We can get to the Bay Area that way. But other times, when you need water and it's not available and we screwed it up the Bay Area that way. But other times when you need water and it's not available and we screwed it up, you pay for it.

And the people of California deserve better, and we're just not getting that right now. Will this upend things? It should. I mean, we pay a fortune to live here. People deserve better services. If you pay through the nose, we should a fortune to live here. People deserve better services. If you pay through the nose, we should have an excellent water system.

The firefighters should have what they need. The L.A. Fire Department, they had their budget cut by the mayor and the city council not long before these fires started. There's no reason why we shouldn't have a fully funded fire department. We know we live in a fire zone. We know we live in an area that's at risk for severe fires. Spend the money where it's important. And if we have the money to spend on drug paraphernalia for drug addicts, and we have the money to spend for healthcare for illegal immigrants, then we certainly have the money to spend for trapping water and using water and for fire services.

And we prioritize things that should not be at the top of the list instead. Different topic, but I fear we don't have the money for any of that. But John, we appreciate you being here. Follow John on X, Johnny Don't Like. Also his show on X, John Phillips-2. The show, John Phillips Show, Monday through Friday, 2 to 3 p.m. K show on X, John Phillips-2. The show, John Phillips show, Monday through Friday, 2 to 3 p.m. KBC. Listen, look for it.

John, thanks for being here. I'll let you go. Thanks for having me. Don't forget, he's going to be on Hannity tonight. Oh, you went Hannity tonight, so look for him on Hannity this evening. Oh, he got canceled. There's another show, though. What was the other show you're going to be on? I'm on with Don Jr. tomorrow.

Okay. Excellent. On your show you're going to be on? I'm on with Don Jr. tomorrow. Okay. Excellent. On your show. Or on his show. So, Caleb, do I need to take a break, or can I keep talking? No, that's fine. You can keep going. Yeah.

Okay. It's breaking news. It's fine. So, Chief, let me ask you this. I want to talk just a couple minutes about preparedness, individual preparedness, what the average person should be doing other than cutting their brush back and keeping fuel away from their buildings and making sure their roofs are up to standard and whatnot.

For instance, am I a nut for not having a pump in my backyard to be able to pump water out of my pool to help fight anything that comes our way? Or am I just going to be in the way of firefighting if I try to do something like that? No, I wouldn't say you're a nut. I mean, most people don't. I certainly don't. You know, if you want to and it makes you feel better to do that, that's great. You know, there's risks, though, involved with staying behind after people have been evacuated. Quite frankly, citizens probably save, you know, others may argue with me about this, but they protect and save more property than perhaps even firefighters do. But there are some residences that, quite frankly, if you don't leave, you might die. And so, you know, when we evacuate people, we really would like them to evacuate. I think what I hear most, Dr. Drew,

is, you know, from people, you know, that have evacuated or had close calls is, you know, I knew there was a fire. I was prepared. I had all my stuff together. It looked like it was maybe a half hour, an hour. Next thing I knew, it was there. And then the chaos began, right? Then the panic and everything happens and everything goes out the door. There is value in defensible space. There is value, obviously, in hardening your homes and those sorts of things. But largely what you're protecting against are, you know, the 90-whatever percentile of the fires that we have every year. The fires that we just experienced are a very small percentage, a very small wedge of the overall fires that we have.

However, that very small wedge is also the ones that are killing the most people, firefighters, and damaging or destroying the most structures. So I would argue that if you had a pump in your pool and you had a fire like we've experienced this last couple days with the winds that we've experienced, I think you'd be better off leaving that pump behind and getting the heck out of there. Defensibles.

Well, I'm hearing, yeah, what I'm hearing you say is when the winds blow, get out of there. If itibles. Well, I'm hearing, yeah. What I'm hearing you say is when the winds blow, get out of there. If it's coming your way, it's coming your way. There's nothing you can do about it and just get out of there. And really preparedness is more about cutting things back ahead of time and making sure you have a go plan, you know, the proper things put together, which I think most people in Southern California kind of do these days. They kind of know they've got to at least have their paperwork in order and pull out of the house

and whatever valuables they have and take pictures of everything, that kind of thing. Are there other things that people don't typically think about? Yeah, and I think you're right. I mean, I don't want to marginalize, you know, the preparedness piece because we preach it and we do genuinely mean it. Where we get more caught up, of course, is in the evacuation piece. And what I've experienced over many years, especially after we preach it and we do genuinely mean it where we get more caught up of course is an evacuation piece and and what i've experienced over many years especially after these types of fires and we'll probably hear it again is that the fire department wasn't there where was the fire department how come you know blah blah they they weren't there and quite frankly and you know this

is we can't be everywhere all the time. And in terms of available resources, you know, there were largely until last night two, well, one major fire in Pacific Palisades and then eventually the Eden fire and then another one. But resources were getting there quickly, just very difficult to manage. I think, you know, and even talking with some of the people I did this morning, they are prepared with their papers and those sorts of things. But where do you, you know, where do you keep your pictures? I mean, most people don't always think about taking your laptop or your computer out of there. And so many times we'll instruct our firefighters, you know, once the homes are evacuated, you know, if they're catching on fire and we're going in

there, find their computers find these things because nowadays people aren't keeping those things on albums they're every their life is on these electronics and you're right i agree with you i think in southern california people are so used to disasters that they're thinking about it um yeah but i think it's just the overall it's not going to happen to me and i don't know if it's just the overall, it's not going to happen to me. And I don't know if it's just human nature or what. You'd probably be better. You'd know better than I would.

But I don't think people truly believe it's ever going to happen to them. I mean, I talked to my brother, who thankfully his home was one of maybe very few in Altadena that survived. At least it was when I left. And one of my friends who, you know, I drove him to where his house was literally burning on the ground. And, you know, it was just this daze of, man, I didn't think it would happen to me. And I, quite frankly, I didn't think it would either, you know? Yeah. Yeah.

I know that feeling. That's kind of the, I fight against it because I want to make sure I'm not naive about this and really are you know think it through you know what if we live in sort of a a canyon and so if it really blows it can go up the canyon pretty quick i'm always amazed that it ever seems to have done so but thank god um well i really appreciate spending a little go ahead please something a little bit controversial and some discussion is taking place among some fire chiefs is, you know, we've got the Ready, Set, Go program.

And that's assuming that you've got your stuff ready, and now we tell you to evacuate, you go. What if go is, man, you just smelled smoke, you open the door, and you've got 45 seconds, you've got 30 seconds to go. Where do I go? And I've had people ask, do I jump in my pool? Do I head down the street? And what I share with people is we ought to be providing some basic level of fire behavior training to our communities so they have some awareness of how fire is going to behave. Yes, park your vehicle so it's facing out on a hot, dry forecast, but know where that golf course

is. Know where that high school gym, the park gym the park the big Walmart whatever because what you need to do is maybe go two or three blocks run your car into that open space and let the fire go around you as opposed to getting stuck in traffic and having the fire come over the top you just like a you know in a hotel many of us look at what floor my own where's the staircase on airplane, where's the exit? You should have a plan of if they tell me now, what is my plan? Susan, what did I tell you about the golf course? Well, but we'd have to drive down the hill and just run on the golf course.

We can run into a golf course from where we are, but provided the hillsides aren't on fire. So you've got to have these different ideas. I already figured it out, Drew. So we park our car at the bottom of the hill, and then we run through the neighbor's house to the golf course. Yeah, yeah. But then our car will be in a cul-de-sac, so that's pretty good, right? No, no, that's the other plan. Either we run straight down the hill or we run down the hill to the cul-de-sac. Or go run into the middle of the Rose Bowl. Well, that's the other way. That's a different thing.

Our street is one way in and one way out. So we have to have a plan if that ever catches on. Yeah, and we worry about trees and all that kind of stuff going down. I know. That's why we got a little nervous today. I think we're good. Before I let you go, any speculation about how this is going to play out? We are completely still

here in the San Gabriel Valley. There's no wind, nothing, not a leaf is moving. Does this just sort of settle? Yeah, no, it is. In listening to the meteorologists and in the fire service, you ultimately become almost a weather person, right? I mean, that's

our whole thing. And right now, the weather is behaving as it's been forecasted. And so we're going to have a couple more days of really dry, very low humidities. We're going to have some breezes. But the big blow, for the most part, I believe is over. I don't want to scare anybody, but we're forecasting another santa ana

to begin next tuesday and right now they're saying moderate but a week ago this was forecasted to be moderate and all of a sudden it became strong so you don't always know but we're in that pattern of you know every you know six seven days um having a sand anemone. This used to be September, October, November. Now it seems like it's December, January, February, the months of these kind of patterns. It's so weird. Will this fire, and I'm pointing where it is from where I'm sitting, be out by the time the winds kick up again,

or might it kick up again? I doubt it. Hard to say. I doubt it. So I have a question about jumping in a pool. Yeah, everybody does. I have a question. No, I know. I think I heard that you

shouldn't, but it just seems like such a... An instinct. This is my thing. It could be. I mean, if you're going to jump into that pool, you pretty much resigned yourself. You're going to die. Right. Because your other alternatives are done. And so when people say, well, I don't know. Well, you don't know until that fires on you. And again, I talked to a few people today that decided they were going to stay and protect their homes and ultimately ran out because it's pretty scary. But jumping in the pool could be, may not be. I mean, it's just one of those things that you don't know. Sheltering in your own home.

We've had people, I know people that have, well, not known them, but have been on fires where people have died in their cars escaping the fire. And guess what? Their home survived.

Should they have maybe sheltered in place? So all those things we've thought about. So I think the big headlines are think things through, be prepared, do what you're told by firefighters. Do what they tell you. Take their advice. Chief, I appreciate you being here. I appreciate your service.

I appreciate your candor. And hopefully next Tuesday will not be that big a deal and look forward to one day shaking your hand. And thank you, Foster, at TWC for setting this up today. We appreciate it. We love Foster. It's good to meet another Pasadena out to date. That's right.

We've been marching through the same hoods here for quite some time. And I figured that business about the fire breaks you could relate to because it was such a vivid part of the hillside. And it's just not there now. And you know that forestry management

and fire management preparedness is part of what's going to be criticized in the government. And I know you don't want to talk about it, but I got a problem with at least getting the forestry management back to a standard of 1978 or whatever it was

you said when you were on the cruise. You know, this is 50 years later and we're going backwards. I won't argue with you there. I'm with you on that. Absolutely. Fair enough.

Chief. Thank you so much. Oh, wait. Go ahead, Caleb. Quick question from a viewer. They're wondering if stuff like firefighting foam is available for the average consumer and if that's a good idea for people in these areas to have on hand instead of just water. I think it is.

I think, I don't know for sure, but I I'm pretty sure it is probably at your home Depot or your Lowe's or something like that. You probably need an induction system. You know, if you're going to be pumping it, you know, from the pail, you know, out of your hose and those sorts of things and, you know, foams, gels, other, other products, retardants, other products like that work very well. How long they last, you know, foams, gels, other products, retardants, other products like that work very well. How long they last, you know, depends. We see a lot of the insurance companies now, you know, offering that as part of their service.

If there's a fire nearby, they'll come and spray your home or your vegetation, those sorts of things that works really well. But water still ends up to be a pretty good product when it comes to putting out fire. The pink retardant you see coming out of the aircraft works very well. Also, it coats the leaves and even when it's dry. But it's just that it's a retardant. It is not necessarily going to stop the fire and you still need to get, you know, people in there. It's still very much a job where you've got to get firefighters, bulldozers, some sort of things in there to get that fire line down to mineral soil. But yeah, there are some good products out there for sure. Chief, thanks again. Hope to meet you soon. Thank you, there are some good products out there, for sure. Got it. Chief,

thanks again. Hope to meet you soon. Thank you, sir. Thank you. Great talking with you. Caleb, do I need to run ads and we come back? Is that what we're doing or what are we doing here? This is a special show today. Yeah, this is a special breaking news show, so I'll do some stuff at the end. And I think everyone knows who our great sponsors are, like TWC

and Paleo Valley and everyone else. You didn't really set up the chief. I think that's wonderful. Yeah. So a little backstory on TWC, the guy who runs it used to, well, his family runs the large airplane helicopters that drop the water all over Southern California. They're based in Orange County. And they have their Air Force in Palm Springs.

And I was talking to him this morning about something else, and I just said, oh, he goes, tell me where you live. We'll come drop water on your house. I was like, no, I don't need it. He goes, do you want to talk to this chief? And I said, great, let's do it.

So he set it up. And thank you. We really appreciate it. And we also appreciate the sponsorship. If anybody needs an emergency kit, like Drew's going to show you. I think it's why TWC is so preparedness-minded, because they come from that discipline. Yeah, so.

And this is our ultimate kit. This would be something good to have if you're thrown out of your house. Field emergency kit. This is the big one. This would be something good to have if you're thrown out of your house. Field emergency kit. This is the big boy. This has got all of our products in it. And you get a telehealth visit. You get a handbook. And you get preparedness for everything.

I've got those ready to go if we ever have to pack up and run. So, yeah, it's good to have. Yeah, I agree. Especially if your doctor's office burns down. It might be controversial. So in this case, if you are in Los Angeles right now and all this smoke and debris is in the air, should you be masking?

People are doing it. I noticed, I tell you what Susan did. She got all the air purifying systems, our HEPA filter systems, and it's marked improvement, significant improvement in our house, even though when you go outside, you really feel it. And it can make a fire. As you go up into the fire zones, yes, I think the masks are appropriate

because it really becomes hard to breathe. And eye drops or something because the eyes get really affected. So if you're spending time in proximity to the fire zone, yes. Down here, I think the main thing is controlling the internal environment of where you're staying. It's not a medical question, but

do you know, is there a certain type of mask or are these just like the N95 masks work for this type of stuff? N95 seems to be the best, but N95 seems to be the best, but even then, this is, again, that's what it's designed for, it's particulate sort of size stuff,

but it, again, these things have to be worn perfectly, and I think the main thing is, don't go outside and exert yourself if you're in smoke. It's very simple. I'm allergic.

I woke up feeling sick today, like, just from breathing. You know what, I was, you know, Susan, in the middle of the night,

you talked about preparedness. I smelled smoke at five o'clock this morning. Oh, yeah. I smelled it last night. Okay. And Paulina and Tracy said, oh, we just made a fire. I go, no, I smell smoke. But I noticed it woke me up.

It was so intense. And then I heard the wind, and I thought, oh, crap. We need to get out of here. But I looked outside, and I couldn't see any light. There was no fire, no flame. So I thought, I'm going to kind of see how it goes. But we need to kind of think about that. I should have been more diligent

about checking all the way around the house. I'm surprised you can't get like fire alarms, smoke fire alarms or something on the outside of your house to tell you if there's a fire. It's a good question. Or a a fire heat detector whatever good question again uh but i think you know i bet you could i think what i heard him say is we need to maybe get that we need to get some snorkels for our pool we need to get uh maybe a pump for the water we need to get some fire retardant stuff you're gonna generate we're not prepared the way we quite should be.

I know. We need to have very- I just want to get the fuck out. I'm sorry. Well, I agree with you. I'm not going to sit here and try to save myself. I'm glad you're agreeing with me that the golf course is the way to go.

We got to find a way out of this stupid course. Okay. We should probably clear all the brush on our hillside and make a straight beeline for the- Because we have a golf course about what a hundred yards straight down the back of our house so you just have to have like a shoot that can slide down well that maybe we should mark that out ahead of time but if the hillside is on fire then you're going to go down this way it's it's it's dicey it's a little dicey but we'll

figure it out. Be that as it may, I'm looking at the restream here. I think our area is the only area that hasn't burned in Pasadena. So the 20 years we've been here, 30 years. Oh, I don't say it. There's winds coming on Tuesday. And this is definitely a zone that would burn. So I just, geez. No, I'm glad he said golf course

because I feel like having big, open, grassy areas around you is a good place to own a piece of property because you don't have to worry. You know, there's going to be a, it's going to stop. We don't have that much brush below us.

Enough to just burn the house though. Yeah. All right. So, uh excellent appreciate you guys being here let's put up our upcoming guests here the house is gonna burn what are you gonna do i know i know that's the point if it's really blowing that that's the one thing i learned today too is if it's really blowing then that's it that's that's it i've never seen anything like that like i i just can't believe it. I'll tell you the sign to me that it was extraordinary winds.

I was always told that palm trees just die. They never fall down in the wind. Orange Grove has downed palm trees at the base. Like, boom. I've never seen that. I've never seen that before. Yep. Never seen that before.

So, we're going to talk about, of course, we go upcoming guests um naomi wolf that's tomorrow and then uh kelly victory is going to come in on friday with harry fisher jeff die finally is going to get in here on the 14th we have a fry on the 15th dave rubin on the 16th salty cracker coming in later in the month uh we got a bit of travel coming in here too. My foster's dad wanted to join. I didn't see that. Oh. Oh, well. He's the guy that runs the planes.

Yes. We appreciate their efforts. You can get him on in the next minute. We'll talk to him on a different day. It's so close. I mean, if he wants to jump on a call right now, I can get him on. We may need more fire experts next week when the trends kick up

again. So we'll see. Do you remember being out here during the winds? Oh, I absolutely do. I absolutely remember my apartment one year. It was so bad, and this was very far away from us, but it was so bad that you would see an outline of our front doormat. It would

just be an outline of brown and black stuff and you pick up the mat and it'd just be a completely different color underneath. Just because of the stuff flying through the air and making everybody cough. Miles and miles away. So there's people in the stream that are saying they're getting bad air all the way up in San Francisco or San Diego

from this right now. Let me see. Looking at this stuff. All right. So what's striking to me is how this one hit in such a bad area in both cases. Usually these are brush fires. They get into the brush.

These are urban fire. This is residential fires. That's what made this one different. And it didn't need to be a huge magnitude in terms of distance to cause huge problems. You see the hills up above the red? That's normally where our fires are, up in there.

Yeah, where Caleb's cursor is. This time it came down the hill into our stuff. I don't know. It feels like that was different and... You know, it's interesting because every year the fire department comes around and goes, okay, we have to look at your brush around your house. We have like a big hillside next to us.

It's empty and it's full of brush. And I don't know how to get them to trim that back. But I think the insurance company also comes and looks at everything to make sure there's certain rules. And they've also stopped insuring these areas because there's nothing you can do. We just heard about that. They're in that fire zone. And I just never would. I mean, we're really lucky to have fire insurance, but we pay really a lot of money.

But also, I have to keep the trees trimmed, and it has to be, you know, it's just super, it's a lot of work. It's expensive. No, but also, you know, I was thinking about changing insurance companies, and our insurance person said, no, don't do it because it's impossible to get fire insurance now.

Wow. What are you circling there, Caleb? What'd you circle? I'm circling also, there's four different places that it looks like on the map where this is happening. So there's this one that's higher up.

Yeah, the fires. Like it's almost- That's the brush fire. It's kind of the brush fire. There's a smaller one right there. That's over by JP. That's, I think that, okay, so the little one you put up there is JPL

and maybe into Altadena. Where was the fourth one? This one's down over- That's Pal I think that, okay, so the little one you put up there is JPL and maybe into Altadena. Where was the fourth one? This one's down over, that's what? That's Palisades. That's Palisades. And then this is where? That's the Pasadena one, the fourth one. Well, Sylmar is constantly on fire.

Yeah. Or is that Sylmar way up there in the? Sylmar. I see. I see Sylmar. Okay, got it. So I just. We're signing on, Caleb.

We're going to get Sir Coulson. Oh my gosh. My brother just texted me. Oh, wow. My goodness. He's worried about you. It must be scary on the news because I haven't talked to him in a long time. Anyways.

Which Coulson am I talking to? Coulson Sr. What's his dad's name? Oh, he's coming on right now? Yeah. Oh, I didn't run the credits. Okay, good. Let's see.

All right, we'll get him in. I can't remember his first name. Once I see him coming up on the Zoom call, we'll get him in to give just like some quick words here. There he is. Let's see. Say it again, Susan. It's from Colson, you know, Colson.

Yep. Hi, Dr. Drew. There you are. Welcome. Thank you so much, and thank you for giving us the fire chief today, and thank you for the firefighting efforts. It makes us feel more secure, frankly, knowing you.

What does it look like from your perspective out here? Is this something that, you know, you've never seen anything like it, the way the fire chief said, or do you feel like you've got this under control? What are your sort of thoughts? Yeah, definitely not under control, Dr. Drew. This has been just unprecedented fire, siege that Southern California is under right now. And boy, is it unbelievable.

We finally got up flying here just a little while ago. We've been down since five o'clock yesterday afternoon. We tried to get up again last night at eight o'clock and we got turned around at Malibu because of the excessive winds. But we are back up flying. We're up in Palmdale right now with some of the machines. So we're back in the fight and I expect we'll be flying all night tonight. Thank you because I went up into the Altadena fire, the Eden fire, which is about four miles

from our house here. And the one thing I noticed, there was not air support. I'm like, damn, we need that. We really need it. So thank you. Because they're having trouble with pumping water. The pump stations are all burned up. Yes. And I know for us is, you know,

we can't start the aircraft in a 30 mile an hour wind because when we're cranking up, the blades will hit each other. So, you know, we've been waiting for that, the wind to die down. wind because when we're cranking up the blades will hit each other. We've been waiting for the wind to die down so we finally got a couple machines, three of the five or four up right now.

We're back making progress. Any sort of advice for us? Do you feel like this is something that is going to continue to progress? There's no wind now. Everything's still out here. Are we kind of, everyone kind of stay in place and rest assured that this is going to kind of get managed or stay vigilant, get ready to move still? Well, I think now we've been watching the weather, of course, and we're seeing the winds

die down and that gives, that'll give us the time to take a deep breath and then we can really get out of the ground and the air can really go to work now and uh you know we'll the everybody will get control of it relatively quickly so i think you know just uh you know watching the news and and you know if uh there's an evacuation order you know they they do that uh for a reason so i would say that everybody needs to follow you know what they do that for a reason. So I would say that everybody needs to follow, you know, what the first responders are getting advised. Wayne, we were just signing off. So I'm going to continue to say thank you and sign off and appreciate you. And, you know,

everything you and your crews do for us out here in Southern California, we are so, so, so grateful. And just to know you guys have all that equipment. I thought I might talk to Baron Coulson about it. Maybe he could tell me about the aircraft in particular, but he wasn't available. He's busy with the fires. He's still at school in grade six.

You know, so nice to talk to you, Dr. Drew. All right, Wayne, good to see you. Be well, thank you. Okay, so Wayne runs the Air Force that to see you. Be well, thank you. Okay, so Wayne runs the Air Force that you see in the air here over Southern California when you see the fire retardant going down, the helicopters in particular he was talking about. It was a family-owned lumber business

in Canada, which Foster worked with, and then he ended up taking over this fleet to take care of the fires in California. They gave over the logging to the Native American tribes locally. They developed their firefighting capability and now they

fight all the fires up and down the hemisphere. South America, North America. We got to see some of the cool planes. There they are. Oh, look at that. There's their stuff. They have big old is that a DC-10 or something? The legit ones. Like that's a gigantic jet dropping this. Yeah. These are the guys you want to see in the air like that's a gigantic jet dropping this yeah yeah and these

are the guys you want to see in the air when there's a fire you want you see this come in and you think i'm safe i'm fine now i'm saved i think they have the i think they have the biggest private air force in the country in and it's their their base is in palmdale he said it was in palmdale did he say or is it palm springs He said something about Palmdale, so then maybe we're at the helicopter charm. Look at that. Isn't that great? Oh my God, I'm so excited to know these guys. Wow, look at that. Yeah. That's

our guys. So that's Wayne's business. Alright, you guys. I'm exhausted. I've been traveling for days. I'm just, ugh. Keep an eye out for Dr. Drew Uncensored on Lifetime. That's what I was filming in Florida. And we will be in here

tomorrow at 3. Is that correct? Yes. Got lots, again, great guests coming in. Tomorrow is Naomi Wolf coming back around. Emerald Robinson. A lot to talk about. I'm sure Naomi will freak us out further with the material

that her husband has been presenting her with and she's of course has presented the Pfizer papers and that story

is evolving further I'm sure she'll have some comments also about the grand jury in Florida so stay tuned we'll see you tomorrow at 3 o'clock

we appreciate you being here Friday o'clock will be Kelly Victory making a command performance and we will stay safe here in Southern California as the rest of us should. This is a tough time out here. So we'll see you tomorrow.

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