Firefighter helps rescue dog while battling Eaton Fire: ‘I need to find that dog’
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(ALTADENA, Calif) — While entire neighborhoods were ablaze in Altadena, California, on Wednesday, a scared dog named Max barked at the out-of-control flames engulfing his home.
A firefighter saw him curled up in his front yard, alone and scared. As the fireman sprayed the flames, the dog got closer and closer.
The fireman put his hand out. And the dog came.
“Visibility was pretty poor initially, so we found a place that we could stake out, especially with the winds and the conditions that we were in,” firefighter Slater Lee told ABC News’ Matt Rivers.
“I heard a dog barking, and I was like, ‘I need to find that dog,'” he said.
“The whole garage was involved in pretty heavy flames, and I looked to my side, and the dog was seated with its tail between its legs, just curled in the corner of the front yard, still barking, just in a really sad position,” Lee added.
Lee put his hand down every so often to coax the 60-pound dog into feeling comfortable with him.
“I had the nozzle in one hand cooling the garage, so [the fire] wouldn’t extend over to the house, and then trying to pet the dog and make some light of the situation,” he said.
Meanwhile, the Eaton Fire has continued to grow. It has now scorched more than 14,000 acres with 37% containment, according to Cal Fire. At least 16 people have died in the Eaton Fire, according to the LA County medical examiner.
“I don’t like to take individual credit for anything, you know, and by no means was it any sort of an individual effort,” Lee said of comforting Max. “There’s my whole crew behind me.”
Lee has only been a firefighter for about six months, still on probationary status with the San Marcos Fire Department. His chief told ABC News that some new recruits come and go but “Slater is one of the good ones. He’s going to be sticking around.”
Lee kept the dog calm until another couple of concerned citizens were able to take him. They got him to safety, out of the fire zone, while Lee stayed behind, continuing his work.
Max made it back to his family, alive and well, if a bit traumatized.
(LOS ANGELES) — Family members have begun to identify the Los Angeles residents who were killed in the wildfires sweeping through the area since Jan. 7.
As of Sunday evening, the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner said it was investigating at least 14 fire-related deaths from the Eaton and Palisades Fires which have burned through thousands of acres.
Here is what we know of the deceased victims.
Anthony and Justin Mitchell
Hajime White told ABC News that her father, Anthony, and brother Justin, were killed in the Eaton fire in Altadena.
Both had disabilities and were in wheelchairs and were waiting for an ambulance to transport them to relatives, White told ABC News.
White says her father called her the morning of the fires, saying he knew the fire had broken out and he had to evacuate. He told her he loved her, and then all of a sudden, he said, “Baby, I gotta go. The fire is in the yard,” according to Hajime.
“And that’s the last words I have from my dad,” she said.
Anthony was an amputee and lived with Justin who had cerebral palsy, according to White.
Anthony had several grandchildren, including Hajime’s six daughters, and welcomed two great-grandchildren last year, according to his daughter.
“He was a great man. A great dad that any little girl could want,” she said.
White said Justin was very smart and enjoyed reading, especially the newspaper with their dad.
“He’d try his hardest to say ‘hi.’ He tried to tell me he loved me,” White said of her brother.
Victor Shaw
Victor Shaw died he died in a heroic attempt to protect his home in Altadena, his sister Shari Shaw, told ABC News.
Shaw lived in the family home since 1965, and had health issues that impacted his mobility, according to his sister.
“I can’t imagine what he might have been thinking, how he might have been so frightened,” Shari said.
Charles Mortimer
The Los Angeles County Medical Examiner’s office confirmed on Sunday that 84-year-old Charles Mortimer was among those killed in the fires.
Mortimer’s family said he “truly lived life to its fullest.”
“He was a world traveler, a sun worshipper and an avid sports fan,” the family said, adding that he was happy to see his “beloved” Chicago Cubs win the World Series.
“He will be remembered as a man with a quick wit, a brilliant mind, and a love for his family. His infectious smile and never-ending sense of humor will be greatly missed by his friends and family all over the world,” the family said.
ABC News’ Sean Keane and Mola Lenghi contributed to this report.
(ATHENS, Ga.) — Police questioned the man accused of killing Laken Riley about multiple scratches on his arms a day after the 22-year-old nursing student was found murdered on the University of Georgia’s campus, body camera footage played Monday during the suspect’s bench trial showed.
Police spoke to the defendant, Jose Ibarra, who is an undocumented migrant, at his apartment in Athens on Feb. 23, while investigating Riley’s death. The Augusta University student was found beaten in a wooded area on the Athens campus on Feb. 22 after she didn’t return from a run, authorities said. Her brutal death became a rallying cry for immigration reform from many conservatives, including President-elect Donald Trump.
Special prosecutor Sheila Ross said last week that Ibarra was “hunting” for women on the campus and encountered Riley while she was on her run. Ross said the evidence shows an extended struggle ensued and Riley “fought for her life” before dying due to blunt force trauma and asphyxiation. Ibarra’s DNA was found under Riley’s fingernails, according to Ross.
Officers questioned Ibarra in connection with the murder after a suspicious jacket was found in a dumpster near his apartment, Ross said. Ring camera footage captured a man discarding the jacket, which had Riley’s hair on it, in the dumpster at 9:44 a.m. on Feb. 22, about 16 minutes after she died, Ross said.
University of Georgia Police Sgt. Joshua Epps testified Monday that he noticed a scratch on Ibarra’s right bicep while questioning him at his apartment.
“On his left arm, he had a forearm scratch that was very similar, which in my mind, looked like fingernail scratches to me,” Epps said.
Epps said he also observed a fresh “puncture” on Ibarra’s left wrist.
Prosecutors entered into evidence on Monday photos of Ibarra’s scratches on his arms and bruising on his palm.
Body camera footage of the officers’ questioning Ibarra was also played in court.
When asked about what happened to his right bicep, Ibarra told officers that he had a scratch but “didn’t exactly explain from where or how,” University of Georgia officer Rafael Sayan, who was called to translate during the questioning, testified on Monday.
When asked what happened to his left wrist, Ibarra first said he didn’t have anything there, then said, “It’s just a scratch,” according to Sayan.
When asked why his knuckle was red, Ibarra said it was because of the cold, Sayan said.
Ibarra was detained following the questioning, Epps said. He was arrested that day on murder charges in connection with Riley’s death.
During testimony on Monday, one of Ibarra’s roommates identified Ibarra as the man discarding the jacket in the dumpster, based on his cap and loafers.
Ibarra, 26, has pleaded not guilty to malice murder and felony murder.
Police have said they believe Ibarra — a migrant from Venezuela who officials said illegally entered the U.S. in 2022 — did not know Riley and that this was a “crime of opportunity.”
Additional charges in the 10-count indictment include aggravated battery, kidnapping with bodily injury, aggravated assault with intent to rape, obstructing or hindering a person making an emergency telephone call and tampering with evidence. The latter charge alleged that he “knowingly concealed” evidence — including the jacket found in the dumpster — involving the offense of malice murder.
Ibarra waived his right to a jury trial. The case is being presented in the Athens-Clarke County courtroom to Judge H. Patrick Haggard, who will render a verdict.
(LOS ANGELES) — The power of the ocean could soon be used to power homes in the U.S. as scientists prepare to test an untapped form of renewable energy.
The U.S. Department of Energy has invested $112.5 million to advance the commercial readiness of wave energy technologies by harnessing the powerful waves of the Pacific Northwest.
The first-ever facility, equipped with open water testing is set to begin operations off a seaside Oregon town next summer, Burke Hales, a professor of oceanography at Oregon State University who has involved in the launch, told ABC News.
Named Pacwave, PacWave the facility was built with the infrastructure to house four separate test berths, each with its own dedicated cable that leads from about 7 miles offshore back to the coastal facility, Matthew Grosso, director of the Department of Energy’s Water Power Technologies Office, told ABC News.
It’s a project that was more than a decade, requiring years of permit approvals with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and input from all of the federal ocean agencies, including the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, the National Fisheries Service and the Marine Mammal Commission, Hales said.
The five-year investment from the federal government will involve testing by companies to accelerate the design, fabrication and testing of wave energy converters (WECs), which will harness power from ocean waves, which will then be converted at PacWave into energy that will supply the power grid.
Ocean wave energy could soon become synonymous with other natural sources of power like wind, solar and geothermal. In the U.S., there’s enough marine energy resources, including waves, tides, rivers and ocean currents to power over half of the country’s energy demands, Grosso said.
The renewable could prove to be even be more abundant, unlike solar, which ends when the sun sets, and wind, which isn’t always available, Hales said. The biggest challenge marine energy presents is how new it is compared to the other renewables, which have extensive existing infrastructure, Grosso said.
“Wave is this great complement to the other renewables, because it’s sort of slow and steady, he said. “There are basically always waves on the ocean.”
How is it possible to collect energy from ocean waves?
Using water to create energy is nothing new, the experts said. Traditional water mills were found in China as early as 30 A.D., and humans have been extracting power from the flow of water ever since.
But while water mills rely on the movement of the tide, PacWave will be focusing on surface waves in the open ocean, Hales said.
Devices bobbing up and down on the ocean surface like a buoy harness the natural movement of the water and send the captured energy back to shore via underwater pipes, Grosso said. The devices are located about 7 miles offshore.
One of the challenges is the waves can arrive erratically, so building devices that can withstand a challenging environment is key, Maha Haji, an assistant professor of mechanical, aerospace and systems engineering at Cornell University, told ABC News.
From its shoreside facility, PacWave then takes the power that comes from the wave generation devices and makes it compatible to enter the Central Lincoln Public Utility District, Grosso said.
The PacWave facility is currently in its commissioning phase, Hales said.
“We have to run the system through a number of tests to make certain that we don’t have a short circuit out there miles into the ocean that we have to go fix,” he said.
These US locations are best suited for harnessing ocean energy
While the U.S. is surrounded by coastlines, there are only a few regions where the generation of ocean wave power is viable.
Places with the biggest waves — Hawaii, Alaska and the Pacific coast — are the best locations to utilize wave energy converters due to the strength and consistency of the waves, the experts said.
However, wave energy can also be combined with other renewables, so there are benefits to combining wind, wave and solar together — making Texas another viable option, due to its existing renewable infrastructure, despite the Gulf of Mexico being in calmer waters, Haji said.
When it came time to selecting the best location to put the test facility, Northern California and central Oregon were deemed best suited, Hales said.
Southeast Alaska also has energetic waves, but the coastline is challenging, and the region is not equipped with the necessary infrastructure to connect the collected energy to the local grid.
Input from local communities played a big role in planning
PacWave will be operating out of two different sites — each located near Newport, Oregon, a deepwater port. The inception of the project was devised “hand-in-hand” with the local community, Grosso said.
The exact locations of the sites were picked by local fishers, who made the determination based on the location of the tow lanes that access the port, depth conditions, strength of the waves and whether the local community would be supportive, Hales said.
That level of consideration for the local ecology and economy continues to impact the PacWave project, the energy experts said.
Application documents included fine details on the regional ecosystem, including what kind of shrimp burrow in the nearby sand, fish that are attracted to the region and the marine mammals that could possibly be impacted by the presence of the devices, Hales said. The permits contain a requirement for acoustic monitoring to make certain the devices aren’t changing the underwater noise distributions and ways that impact marine mammals.
This was all done to minimize the impacts on the environment, Hales said, adding that community members have been concerned about the potential hazard to wildlife and the presence of offshore wind infrastructure.
“It was an exhaustive effort to identify where the problem might be, avoid those problems, and, if they’re unavoidable, talk about mitigating them,”
Engaging the community has resulted in “very little footprint” in the construction of the sites, Grosso said.
“It’s hard to tell that there’s anything there,” he said.
