LOS ANGELES, CA – As the deadly wildfires spread across Los Angeles County, many residents say they were left in the dark, receiving evacuation orders only after their neighborhoods were already engulfed in flames. Officials are now facing scrutiny over delays in issuing alerts, with Los Angeles County approving an independent review into the effectiveness of emergency notifications during the Eaton and Palisades fires.
For some, the first warning came in the middle of the night via a text alert. Others never received an official notice at all. Susan Lee Streets, a resident of west Altadena, said she and her family left their home around 10 p.m. after losing power and cell service. She had signed up for emergency alerts but did not receive any specific to her neighborhood before evacuating. The first notification she saw on her phone came after 3 a.m. when their home was already lost. “If we had even been informed that houses and other structures were burning down, we would have known better what was happening,” she said.
The lag in evacuation orders follows a pattern seen in previous disasters, including California’s 2017 Tubbs Fire, the 2018 Camp Fire, and the 2023 Lahaina Fire in Hawaii. Emergency alerts rely on a complex chain of communication between firefighters, law enforcement, government agencies, and third-party alert systems. In the chaos of a fast-moving wildfire, that system can break down.
Scanner recordings and incident reports indicate that between midnight and 3:30 a.m. on January 8, first responders struggled to issue timely alerts. At 12:07 a.m., records from Cal Fire show that evacuation orders were issued for neighborhoods east of Altadena’s North Lake Avenue. But none had been issued for the west side—where all 17 confirmed fatalities occurred—despite reports of homes burning in the area over an hour earlier.
Fire crews, overwhelmed by the scale of the disaster, spent hours relaying new addresses as flames consumed homes. Just before 3:30 a.m., evacuation orders expanded significantly, covering 12 areas of Altadena and beyond. But by then, many had already fled, navigating the crisis with little official guidance.
Jodi and Jeff Moreno first learned about the fire through a neighborhood app. Their first official warning came at 2:30 a.m. when authorities drove by with a bullhorn, telling residents to leave. “On the neighborhood apps, some people were going, some people were staying. It was a wide variety of responses,” Jodi Moreno said. “It’s hard for us to gauge where exactly is that fire, where are the embers blowing. … Those are things I would rely on people who are monitoring it” for information.
Seeking more reliable updates, the Morenos and Streets turned to Watch Duty, a private app that consolidates emergency information from multiple sources. Nick Russell, the company’s vice president for operations, said official communication often lacks transparency. “Telling people why that discussion is taking place between law enforcement and fire is important. And that’s what we’re doing.”
The process of issuing evacuation orders typically starts with firefighters or emergency personnel on the ground making recommendations. These then move up the chain of command to law enforcement, who issue the formal orders. During major disasters, coordination can be hindered by radio issues, wind interference, or overwhelmed command centers struggling to synthesize large amounts of incoming data.
Los Angeles County residents who sign up for emergency alerts are directed to a patchwork of systems, including AlertLA, the city’s NotifyLA system, and additional alert platforms managed by the Sheriff’s Department and local municipalities. It remains unclear how well these systems coordinate or whether officials are able to disseminate real-time alerts effectively.
A 2024 hazard mitigation plan directed the city’s Emergency Management Department to assess gaps in alert coverage, but the initiative was assigned only a “medium” priority level, with an expected completion timeline of up to 10 years. The county’s own mitigation plan, last updated in 2020, did not list emergency alerts as a high-priority area, instead focusing on public education regarding wildfire risks.
Officials at the county’s Coordinated Joint Information Center declined to comment beyond confirming that an independent review of evacuations and emergency notifications is planned. The Office of Emergency Management, County Fire Department, and Sheriff’s Department have pledged to cooperate fully with the inquiry.
As of Tuesday, the Eaton Fire was 99% contained. The investigation into how emergency alerts were handled, however, is just beginning.
