The BBCProfessional chef Darren Anderson always tells people he was “born in the kitchen” – quite literally.
The 45-year-old was born in a home birth at 295 West Las Flores Drive, where he lived with his mother until this week.
On Thursday, he stepped over charred rubble where his kitchen once stood in Altadena, a narrow neighborhood in Northeast Los Angeles.
He was looking for his cast-iron pans in the hope they might have survived the blaze, one of several historic fires burning in the area that have killed at least 16 people and destroyed scores of communities and left thousands homeless.
Across the street – at number 296 – his girlfriend Rachel's house also stands in ashes. The house next door – 281 – where he enjoyed family parties is gone.
About three blocks away, on Devirian Place, where his girlfriend lived, some neighbors tried to fend off the roaring flames that would engulf their homes with garden hoses.
Now they are also searching for valuables in the rubble after a fire wiped out this entire community nestled in the shadow of the San Gabriel Mountains.
It all started on Tuesday night.
Santa Ana winds were fierce most of the day.
Darron was in his front yard just after 6:00 p.m. local time, trying to keep the objects from flying away.
Across the street, at 296 West Las Flores Drive, Rachel Gillespie was taking down Christmas decorations, concerned about her plastic icicles and patio furniture.
The two exchanged concerned looks. “That doesn't look good, does it?” she noted.
At that time, only the wind bothered them.
They had no idea that one of the two worst wildfires in Los Angeles history had just ignited a few miles away, part of a days-long nightmare that would culminate in six flames simultaneously threatening America's second largest city
The Eaton Fire that tore through Altadena has already ravaged more than 14,000 acres, destroying thousands of homes and businesses and leaving 11 dead. By the weekend, Eaton remained only 15% restricted.
In West Los Angeles, the Palisades Fire that started this morning will continue to burn more than 23,000 acres, shrinking a large part of a vibrant community into ashes and killed at least five people.
Daron's neighbor in house 281, Dillon Akers, was working at a donut stand in the Topanga Mall – about 40 miles away – when smoke began to fill their neighborhood.
The 20-year-old rushed back when he heard the news, only to find his corner of northwest Altadena engulfed in flames and family members frantically evacuating their home.
His uncle jumped over their white picket fence to save precious seconds as he stuffed items into the back of his car.
For the next two hours, Dylan did the same, gathering food, medicine, clothing and toiletries. In his haste, he lost his keys and wasted 30 minutes searching the smoky darkness with torches until he found them stuffed into a fence.
During the desperate search, he kept telling himself that local authorities would be able to handle the fire as it raged down the mountain toward the home he shared with his mother, grandmother, aunt and two younger cousins.
Dylan had encountered storms before and seen smoke in the mountains, but this time felt different. This time the orange glow in the sky was right above.
“I was a total 10 on the fear scale,” he said.
At 00:30 on Wednesday, Dillon said he and his mother were the last people off West Las Flores Drive. They may have been the last to get out alive.
The next day, authorities would announce that the remains of a neighbor down the road had been found.
Rachel and Darren had left the neighborhood about two hours before Dylan. Rachel was kicked out by a friend who drove her over to demand: “You have to leave now.”
Rachel – with his wife, toddler, five cats and two days' worth of clothes – said goodbye to the home they had bought just a year earlier.
Darron also grabbed what he could: a guitar he bought when he was 14 with money he earned as an extra in a karate film, and a painting of his family crossing Abbey Road in London, made to look like the iconic album cover of The Beatles.
As people on Las Flores Drive evacuated, Daron's neighbors a few blocks away tried to fight the flames.
At 417 Devirian Place, Hipolito Cisneros and his close friend and neighbor, Larry Villeskas, who lived across the street at 416, grabbed garden hoses.
The scene outside looked hellish.
The garage of one house was on fire. Car in front of another too.
They stretched hoses from multiple homes and flooded the structures – including the house of Daron's girlfriend, Sachi.
“The water was just pushing back. It wasn't even penetrating or anything,” Ippolito said, referring to the bone-dry soil and brush surrounding the homes.
Over time they made progress, putting out embers and spotting fires. Larry thought they might win.
Then their hoses dried up – all because of water pressure problems they would later learn that it hampered firefighting efforts in Los Angeles County amid an intense search.
An explosion rang out nearby, another home burst into flames. Until 01:00 both their families were already packing.
“We tried. We really tried,” Hippolyte said.
By 2:30 a.m. Wednesday morning, police cars were rolling down their street on loudspeakers, telling everyone to leave immediately.
As he turned the corner on his street, Larry watched in his truck's rearview mirror as his garage caught fire.
By 03:00 the street was empty.
Much of the Los Angeles area is made up of neighborhoods and small communities just like Altadena.
Every morning, people filed through the queues from homes to grab a cup of coffee at The Little Red Hen Coffee Shop, stopping to catch up as they left for work in the morning.
Many have described decades of close-knit community here, where they've watched neighbors raise families and children who once played on the street grow up.
But driving through the area for the first time since his world was turned upside down, Daron barely recognizes his neighborhood.
The big blue house that marked a familiar turn is gone. All the landmarks that once guided him are gone. He points out the property to each neighbor, gasping when he realizes no one is standing.
He takes pictures of his home and of Rachel and the street he shares with Dylan. Outside his girlfriend's home — which Larry and Ippolito tried to save — he filmed video and spoke with their families before calling Sachi to describe the condition of her home.
“God, it's all gone,” he says, his voice shaking.
But a few objects remain among the ruins.
At his sister's home on West Las Flores Drive, he found multicolored plastic lawn ornaments stuck in her lawn, somehow untouched by fire.
He plucks each stake from the ground, knowing that while these colorful decorations may seem insignificant against the devastation, they might also make her smile.
Across the street, in what was once his house, the red brick chimney is all that remains standing. Around him is a pile of clay pottery.
With his soot-black hands he gathers what he can, but many pieces fall apart at his touch.
A burnt lemon tree stands on the lawn, some fruit still warm to the touch.
“If I can get a seed, we can replant it,” he says, grabbing a handful.
“It's like a way to start over.”