Searching for what started the Los Angeles wildfire

CNN — A week after wind-whipped wildfires began their deadly rampage through Southern California, details on acreage burned, structures destroyed and people killed are routinely updated on a state website devoted to tracking the devastation. Tim Jones, an ATF deputy assistant director, said 15 members of the response team were assigned to the Palisades Fire following a request from local officials to determine the “cause and origin.” He said the team includes agents with advanced degrees in forensics and other science-based fields who bring a “thoughtful, analytical” approach to unravelling some of the ATF’s most difficult investigations. At a news conference Sunday, Los Angeles Fire Chief Kristin Crowley said “we do not have any information that there’s any connections” between the two fires. 01:44 The Los Angeles Times on Sunday quoted an investigator with Cal Fire as saying the area around the hillside transmission tower was off limits because it was under investigation as “the start of the Eaton Fire.” Edison International, an electric utility, issued a news release Sunday stating that a preliminary analysis of its energized lines found “no interruptions or operational/electrical anomalies in the 12 hours prior to the fire’s reported start time until more than one hour after the reported start time of the fire.” The power company also acknowledged in its statement that it discovered a downed powerline in the area of the Hurst Fire in the San Fernando Valley, north of downtown Los Angeles, but “does not know whether the damage observed occurred before or after the start of the fire.” Several former fire investigators interviewed by CNN said wildfire investigations typically begin with the painstaking work of building a timeline, interviewing witnesses, listening to early 911 calls, looking at before and after images of satellite photos and analyzing weather data. But the reality, he said, is “it comes down to circumstantial evidence in a lot of cases.” California Attorney General Rob Bonta told CNN on Monday he didn’t know whether the investigations into the fires would become criminal matters but added there “are some indications that arson is a possibility that we have to be open to.” He added, “We need to be patient.