Air tankers fight Los Angeles fires from frantic skies

Flying for a private aviation company since 2016, he has seen plenty of fires including the deadly Malibu blazes of six years ago.

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Air tankers fight Los Angeles fires from frantic skies (2025, January 10)
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Looking in almost any direction from a chopper above the city, AFP reporters witnessed half a dozen blazes—eruptions of smoldering smoke emerging from the mountainous landscape like newly active volcanoes, and filling up the horizon.

Around half a dozen helicopters buzzed at low altitude, tipping water onto the edge of the inferno.

“That was insane,” he recalled.

The new Kenneth Fire burst into life late Thursday afternoon near Calabasas, a swanky enclave outside Los Angeles made famous by its celebrity residents such as reality television’s Kardashian clan.

In the skies above Los Angeles, air tankers and helicopters silhouetted by the setting California sun dart in and out of giant wildfire plumes, dropping much-needed flame retardant and precious water onto the angry fires below.

But this, he repeatedly says while hovering his helicopter above the chaos, is “crazy town.”

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