Meryl Streep’s nephew claims that when she had to evacuate from the wildfires in Los Angeles earlier this month, the American actress had to take matters into her own hands.
According to an article by New York Magazine contributor Abe Streep, which was released on Tuesday, the three-time Oscar winner was ordered to leave on January 8, the day after the Palisades and Eaton Fires started.
According to her nephew, when the elder Streep attempted to escape, “she found that a large tree had fallen over in her driveway, blocking her only exit.”
“Determined to escape, she borrowed wire cutters from a neighbour, drove through their yard to escape, and cut a car-size hole in the fence she shared with the neighbours on the other side,” he said.
The Eaton and Palisades fires are regarded as the most catastrophic fires in the history of Los Angeles. Residents are still assessing the shock and damage caused by the fires.
The California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection believes that about 16,200 structures were destroyed or damaged in the fires; however, formal damage assessments are still being conducted.
Joseph Kindred, a resident of Altadena, and the director Jo Lenz was also impacted. He told New York Magazine that on the evening of January 7, he and his family stayed at home.
On January 8, at around three in the morning, he woke up from a twenty-minute snooze and realised they needed to go right now. “Hold my hand, please,” he said to his family outside as flaming embers fell. “There is no time for us to pack anything.” Along with his home, Kindred’s cameras and hard drives—including unreleased video of the late rapper Nipsey Hussle—were destroyed in the Eaton Fire.
Martin Short, who starred in ‘Only Murders in the Building’, described the challenges he faced when trying to evacuate from the Palisades Fire.
He claimed that he was stranded in his car for nearly an hour to go a distance that typically takes five minutes. In the end, his house was saved, but one of his two sons lost it.
According to the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner, 29 persons lost their lives in the wildfires in Southern California. Twelve people had died as a result of the Palisades Fire and seventeen had died as a result of the Eaton Fire as of late Monday.
