LOS ANGELES — All of the 17 deaths confirmed so far in the Eaton fire occurred in areas of western Altadena that received emergency evacuation orders many hours after the fire started.

The fire roared out of Eaton Canyon around 6:30 p.m. on Jan. 7, pushed west by intense Santa Ana winds. Many neighborhoods in eastern Altadena and surrounding areas got evacuation warnings and orders that Tuesday night.

But records reviewed by The Times show that Altadena neighborhoods west of North Lake Avenue did not get electronic evacuation orders until 3:25 a.m. and never received evacuation warnings. By then, burning embers were raining down on neighborhoods on the west side of Altadena and igniting homes.

The first radio report of fire west of Lake came at 10:51 p.m. on the 500 block of East Calaveras Street. Subsequent calls at 11:42 p.m. and 11:55 p.m. relayed reports of additional fires on the same block.

L.A. County emergency officials declined to discuss details of the evacuation process, which they described as a unified command involving the Sheriff’s Department, county fire department and other agencies.

Typically, fire officials recommend areas for evacuation; the county Office of Emergency Management issues evacuation orders; and sheriff’s deputies enforce them, fire and county officials said.

When asked when the evacuation order for areas west of North Lake Avenue was issued, the Office of Emergency Management pointed The Times to records from PBS’ Warning, Alert and Response Network— which maintains an archive of all alerts.

Those records are consistent with Watch Duty alert archives, radio traffic and social media posts reviewed by The Times, which show that the first alert to Altadena residents west of North Lake was an evacuation order at 3:25 a.m. Wednesday.

Officials declined to say whether there were any electronic evacuation alerts for the area issued earlier. The Times could find none in its review.

In a statement, the Office of Emergency Management noted, “Wireless emergency alerts are only one of several means of notifying residents to evacuate their homes during a fire emergency. Our response also includes door knocks, patrols with loudspeakers driving up and down streets messaging the need to evacuate, as well as leveraging local media to help us get the news to residents. This is a layered process and system intended to provide redundancy during local and widespread disasters.”

While witnesses reported seeing deputies trying to evacuate some parts of western Altadena around 2 a.m., it was unclear how early those operations began and how extensive they were.

Officials have vowed to conduct a full review of their actions during the fire.

“While we cannot immediately comment on all factors leading to the tragic loss of life, once the immediate wildfire crisis has passed, there will be a comprehensive third-party evaluation of all response efforts. This review will focus on identifying areas of strength and pinpointing opportunities for improvement, ensuring we are prepared to respond to future emergencies,” read the statement.

“We acknowledge the immense loss and challenges faced by our communities during the fires and remain deeply committed to supporting those affected.”

According to the PBS WARN, the Los Angeles County Office of Emergency Management issued its first public alert at 6:48 p.m. — roughly half an hour after the Eaton fire ignited.

Thousands of residents in eastern portions of Altadena and Pasadena were warned of a “Fast moving wildfire in your area. BE AWARE of your surroundings and MONITOR the situation closely.” Residents also were told to consult alertla.org for more information.

Evacuation orders soon followed: At 7:12 p.m. residents in a small area near Eaton Canyon Golf Course were told to “LEAVE NOW,” while Kinneloa Mesa and much of eastern Altadena received the same message at 7:26 p.m. Evacuation warnings and orders for northeastern Pasadena and much of Sierra Madre — including areas that did not ultimately burn — were all issued before midnight.

At 10:17 p.m. an evacuation warning was issued for a large area, apparently from Santa Anita Avenue to the east and “Lake Street” to the west via X. An evacuation order for a similar area went out minutes later. The order appears to refer to Santa Anita Avenue in Sierra Madre and Arcadia on the east side of the fire. But there is another Santa Anita Avenue a few blocks west of Lake Avenue in Altadena.

Some residents in western Altadena waited as conditions deteriorated.

Some evacuated on their own after seeing an eerie orange glow on the horizon, but others stayed in their homes.

“People were reluctant to leave because they had faith in the system,” said Ester Song, 35.

“There’s no warning, there’s no order happening, so we just had to make the call ourselves,” she said.

At Song’s home on Loma Alta Drive and Chaney Trail, the power had been out since 10 p.m. Song hooked an external battery to her router and modem and was able to communicate with neighbors who couldn’t check the warnings and orders due to spotty cell service and power outages.

Song said she began to grow alarmed around midnight. “I started seeing this glow come over the mountain,” she said. There were “visible flames on the mountains.”

Until then, she had a “sense of false security” because the fire appeared to be moving eastward on the evacuation maps, which she was checking regularly, she said. Seeing warnings and orders to the east and nothing in her neighborhood, west of Lake, she figured “at least there would be a warning if the fire was moving in (her) direction.”

Between 2 and 2:30 a.m., sheriff’s deputies drove by with a speaker telling people to evacuate, Song said. Around the same time, at least three more radio calls came in referencing homes on fire west of North Lake Avenue in Altadena.

“I was outside and I could barely, barely make out what they were saying because of the wind,” Song said of the loudspeaker commands.

At that hour, she questions whether residents inside their homes would have heard the warning.

Song decided to leave after that. “It was really a community effort in getting the word out,” she said. She has not been back but heard from a member of the town council that 90% of the homes in her area burned.

The Times additionally spoke to five residents of west Altadena, none of whom received electronic alerts prior to the 3:25 a.m. evacuation order. Several showed their phones, which had notifications from the evacuation order and none prior.

Less than half a mile from Song’s home, Erliene Louise Kelley, 83, sent a text message to her granddaughter Briana Navarro at 1:22 a.m. “In the living room looking out,” she wrote. “I’m going to take a picture.” The picture never arrived. Kelley died in the fire.

Claire Robinson, another resident who lived west of Lake, said she woke up at 2:20 a.m. to the feeling of smoke filling her lungs.

She and husband Ryan Ihly went to sleep around 10 p.m. knowing their home in the 3200 block of Santa Anita Avenue was not listed as in an evacuation zone.

But when Robinson stepped outside, she saw glowing embers landing on neighborhood homes.

She hurried back inside and woke her husband. “I said, ‘Oh, my God, are we still outside the danger zone? Because I don’t think that’s true. I think we’d better get out of here.’”

There had been no evacuation order on their phones. No one had publicly urged people in their neighborhood to leave. And as they drove away in their van, they saw no firefighters on the smoky streets.

“We were 100% alone,” Robinson said. “There was no system to alert people.”

The couple and other survivors say they were fortunate to escape with their lives, because they had no warning.

“I never would have believed this could have happened,” Robinson said, calling the response to the fire a “systematic failure.”

Robinson is the founder and managing director of Amigos de los Rios, a nonprofit group. She lost not only her family’s home and all their belongings in the fire but also the nearby office of the nonprofit; all were reduced to ash.

After leaving their house, Robinson and her husband drove through the neighborhood looking for emergency personnel. They wanted to tell them to update the map, and to rouse neighbors who could be asleep — including elderly people and those with mobility problems — to tell them to leave.

“We looked everywhere for someone to alert,” she said, “and there was just nobody.”

Finally, about 12 blocks from her house, she found two people parked at an intersection in an official-looking vehicle, though they weren’t wearing Sheriff’s Department uniforms and she wasn’t sure who they worked for.

“This neighborhood’s going to blow,” Robinson recalled telling them.”You’ve got to change the map. You’ve got to get the word out. … Can you do something?”

She said the two seemed dazed and mumbled a response, but they didn’t spring into action.

About 3:30 a.m., when Robinson reached her sister’s place in Westwood, her phone buzzed with an evacuation order. The map had finally been updated.

Robinson said she is mourning the deaths of neighbors who didn’t make it out.. She has spoken with other survivors in Altadena who had similar experiences, such as a nurse who lost a home in a different area, and two employees whose homes burned after not being in the evacuation zone.

“We’re all recounting, ‘Oh my God, we weren’t on the evacuation map. We didn’t hear any sirens or any people telling us to leave,’” she said. “Whoever was managing the maps or managing the comms was not on their game.”

The 800 block of East Sacramento Street is the first block west of North Lake Avenue, and the site of another Eaton fire death. Residents in the area, including those on East Sacramento Street, were the last in Altadena to be issued evacuation orders, at 5:50 a.m.

Residents of the block, standing outside their leveled homes, told The Times that they did not receive evacuation warnings or orders prior to 5:50 a.m. Their neighbors one block east — across North Lake Avenue — received evacuation orders more than 10 hours earlier, at 7:26 p.m. on Tuesday.

The North Lake Avenue line is especially significant in Altadena‘s history because it served as a primary east-west redlining boundary. Decades ago, Black residents were restricted from living east of Lake Avenue, according to Altadena Heritage and the Altadena Historical Society.

In 2023, the Census areas east of Lake had a significantly larger share of white residents than those west of the boundary, according to a Times analysis.

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(Times staff writers Ruben Vives and Grace Toohey contributed to this report.)

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