Firefighters are in a race against the clock trying to stamp out the deadly Los Angeles wildfires this weekend — as more damaging winds threaten to wreak havoc on the region next week.
Powerful winds may pick up again Monday — and stick around through Wednesday, increasing the odds for potential new fires to break out as Southern California suffers from relentless dry heat and no humidity, Fox Forecast Center Meteorologist Stephanie van Oppen warned.
“Any wind event in the future could pose a pretty serious risk to the region since things are still very dry,” van Oppen told The Post, noting that there is no rain forecasted for the next 10 days.
The strong winds that were fueling the flames in Southern California earlier this week died down by Thursday, opening a short window of opportunity for firefighters to contain the Palisades and Eaton fires, which have scorched about 38,000 acres combined.
“There is no fire weather expected this weekend, so they are going to take advantage of that, and hopefully we’ll see dramatic improvements in the containment lines for both,” van Oppen said.
Headway suppressing the wildfires this weekend would “absolutely” be vital if additional blazes break out next week — however, forecasters vary on which of two weather models for next week will come to fruition.
While one model shows strong winds, likely ushering in intense, new fires, a different model shows winds “further off to the east,” van Oppen said, meaning they would have less of an impact on Southern California.
All hope shouldn’t be lost though, van Oppen said, noting how forecasters had predicted devastating Santa Ana winds would cause trouble in the region on Wednesday into Thursday — but the powerful gusts never came.
“A similar situation could play out next week, where if things set up in just the right conditions, they could see another fire weather event. Or it could be like what we saw in the last 48 hours, where we were on edge, bracing for that to happen, but it didn’t really mix to get those strong winds,” van Oppen said.
Firefighters are hoping to make decent headway moving into the weekend with about 55% of the Eaton fire contained and about 22% of the largest fire, the Palisades Fire, under control.
Winds this weekend look like they would be on the firefighters’ side, blowing onshore and bringing much-needed humidity into the dry, parched Los Angeles area.
“That will increase the humidity in the air since it’ll be pulling from the ocean instead of the dry desert,” van Oppen said.
Containment increasing this weekend would “help if we do see a fire weather event break out again next week,” van Oppen added. “Those fires will hopefully be contained enough that they don’t spread. We would just need to be on the lookout for any new fires to develop.”
