By some miracle I was able to convince the chiefs of the four main fire departments responsible for the initial attacks on the Palisades and Eaton Fires to gather in the same room to talk about their experiences on January 7th, 2025, and reveal their lessons learned and set the record straight on some misinformation.
I had very limited time with the chiefs, and with their respective entourages sitting within earshot I knew the interview and time schedule was being monitored. Let me be clear, the interview was not created to lay blame, scream, shout, and chastise – it was created to give the chiefs a forum to talk about the fires from their perspectives, an angle not covered in great length. KNX News has covered just about every other angle of these fires with empathy, professionalism and objectivity. This is no different and the chiefs deserve the same courtesy given to any other newsmaker. Blame, culpability, and liability will eventually be determined in courts of law and investigative conclusions, not in a 90-minute interview.
Jaime Moore is the newest chief of the Los Angeles Fire Department. He was recently appointed as the full-time chief following the termination of former chief Kristen Crowley (Ronnie Villanueva was the interim chief). Moore has been with the agency for decades. And while he wasn’t in charge during the fires, he recognizes he has a tough job ahead of him. He says he’s gone through every available report, investigation and interview to get a better understanding of what happened. Moore admitted mistakes were made on various levels and says the department has already started improvements, including a new drone program to help better monitor hot spots following a fire (this was due to the controversy over the Lachman Fire and subsequent spill-over fire which would become the Palisades Fire). Moore says the most critical lesson learned was creating a better pre-deployment strategy for resources and personnel. He says one of the most important pieces of misinformation comes from the hours after the Lachman Fire was extinguished. There is some controversy and conspiracy about whose property the fire started on, state or local, and who was responsible for the smoldering areas. Also, were firefighters allowed onto the property to do proper mop-up or denied for environmental reasons? And alleged text messages between firefighters surfaced indicating they were leaving the property knowing there was additional fire danger.
Anthony Marrone is the chief of the LA County Fire Department. He has served for forty years and has been the chief since 2023. Marrone also says there were things his agency could have done better. He says pre-deployment was a big challenge and the lack of certain technology hampered aerial mapping, which helps determine the direction of the fire. Marrone says he will implement every corrective action recommended in the after-action reports, and any future recommendations from pending investigations. The department has already spent millions on new technology that advances their capabilities for future large-scale fire events.
Robert Garcia has been the fire chief of the Angeles National Forest since 2015. His crew are part of the US Forest Service. Garcia’s crew were called in to assist both major fires under a mutual aid agreement. He admits that while he wasn’t in charge of the fire attacks, some lessons were ‘re-learned’ and he is using those experiences to pass along to the next generation of firefighters. Garcia observed that most firefighters can recall their one big career fire, but sadly, it seems those ‘one big career fires’ are happening much too often. His agency participated and cooperated in all the investigations and after-action reports even though his agency was never accused of wrongdoing.
Joe Tyler has been the chief of CalFire since 2022. He started as a firefighter in 1990. Tyler’s background and specialty is wildland fires. During the interview Tyler explained how CalFire deployment strategies work and how they try to place trucks and dozers in the most strategic places possible based on past fire behavior, weather conditions, and wind history. Tyler got candid about clearing up rumors and misinformation. He said at no time did any firefighter walk off a fire or refuse to fight a fire. He further explained the controversy surrounding out of state trucks which were allegedly held up at the state line because of emissions violations. Tyler says that was absolutely false. He said some of the trucks were held up for about 30 minutes to do a quick safety check and retrofit some trucks with needed safety and wildfire gear. He also explains why, during a massive fire, you may still see a fire engine sitting in a fire station. Tyler flew down from Sacramento for this interview.
To hear the complete interview go to the LA Local podcast:
You can watch the full interview here:
Full disclosure: I had to agree that some information could not be discussed because of pending litigation. It’s not an uncommon request from a newsmaker involved in a court case. While I can’t tell you what was omitted from the interview, I can tell you the four edits in the audio/video portions total eleven seconds. Also, at the time of taping, the story about the altered after action report from the LAFD hadn’t been published and Chief Moore told me later he had no idea about it until it surfaced as a news story. He says he’s still trying to find out who altered the report.
Follow KNX News 97.1 FM
Twitter | Facebook | Instagram | TikTok