When the air is warm and dry, transpiration and evaporation also suck water out of the plants and soil. That leaves dry vegetation that can provide fuel for flying embers to spread wildfires, as the Los Angeles area saw in early January.

Other fires, like the 2023 Maui fires and the 2017 Tubbs Fire in Northern California, have caused hydrants to go dry in the past, and it seems L.A. will need to go back to the drawing board if these kinds of wildfire-scale urban blazes become the new normal.

Some Los Angeles fire hydrants ran dry in recent days as demand soared for water to quell fast-moving wildfires.

Fire hydrants in Los Angeles ran dry in parts of the city when firefighters needed them most, and some of the problems came from pumping water. The problems with the water pressure running dry in the hydrants,

The series of fires that started spreading on Tuesday continue to ravage southern California, leaving a trail of devastation across LA, home to Hollywood.

Martin Adams, former general manager of the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, blows up some right-wing myths about the water supply in Pacific Palisades, and talks with Alex Wagner about the realities of municipal water systems and ideas for adapting a system built for occasional residential fires to deal with a large scale,

Dry conditions across Southern California set the stage for a series of deadly wind-driven wildfires that burned thousands of homes in the Los Angeles area in early January 2025. Ming Pan, a hydrologist at the