Firefighter village sprouts on Malibu beach

A huge village has sprung up on the golden sands of a beach in Malibu, housing thousands of firefighters.

Firefighters from all over North America eat, sleep and recuperate on Zuma Beach when they aren’t battling the wildfires across Los Angeles.

About 5,000 first responders mingle among the trailers and tents. The camp comes to life before dawn, as thousands line up for breakfast.

The standards of dozens of firefighting battalions mark the presence of crews from across California and the western United States, as well as a contingent of newly arrived Mexicans.

Breakfast is the most important meal of the day for many, a chance to load up on calories before their shift.

The food is prepared by a team of inmates from California’s prisons, brought in to help in one of the biggest disaster responses the state has ever seen.

Correctional Officer Terry Cook, who supervises inmates at the base, said he occasionally sees a familiar face among the regular firefighters, someone who got themselves back on the straight and narrow after serving their sentence.

“I’ve run into inmates that were at my camp two years ago, and I see them in line here, and I shake their hands, and I say ‘congratulations,’” he said.

Two huge fires in Los Angeles have scorched 40,000 acres (16,000 hectares) since erupting in fierce winds last Tuesday.

At least 24 people have died in the blazes, which have destroyed more than 12,000 structures and forced 92,000 people from their homes, including the well-to-do Pacific Palisades, just a few miles from the firefighters’ camp.

After breakfast, teams prepare their vehicles and arm themselves with snacks, sandwiches, drinks and sweets.

With the threat of dangerous winds across a swath of the region, some units are charged with pouncing on new outbreaks, while others are tasked with tamping down the original blaze.

Orders in hand, each team sets off, fanning out along streets into Pacific Palisades, or up into the untamed brush of Topanga Canyon.

For some, it is their first time in the field as part of this firefighting effort; for others, it is one more day in an already long week.

As he readies to climb into Mandeville Canyon, Jake Dean says he has never seen a fire as destructive as this in his 26 years as a firefighter.

“After the first day, many people that I’ve known for a long time in base camp barely recognised me,” he said. “My phone didn’t recognise me to turn on, I was so tired and dirty.”

But with huge air operations eating into the fire on all fronts, Dean can feel the work paying dividends.

“Today will be not so bad,” he said. “We’ll pace ourselves and drink lots of water and be ready for a long haul of work here and the next fire.”

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