LA fires: Sister of Bollywood star watched her Pacific Palisades home burn from India

Chinmaya Misra was visiting family in the Indian city of Jaipur last week when she woke up to nearly 100 text messages on her phone from friends and neighbours checking up on her.

That is how she heard about an apocalyptic inferno in Los Angeles threatening her home in the Pacific Palisades neighbourhood. Hours later, Ms Misra and her husband, Apurva Pande, learnt their condominium had been lost as friends sent images of the devastation, including a screenshot from a news broadcast showing her home engulfed in flames.

“It was kind of an out-of-body experience,” she recalled. “It was surreal.”

Images of her torched home, along with sympathies for the fire victims, were shared on social media by her brother, Hindi cinema star Satyadeep Misra, and sister-in-law Masaba Gupta, a famous fashion designer and actress, who both live in Mumbai.

The Bollywood actor flew to New Delhi where he spent a couple of days with Ms Misra, Mr Pande and their 16-year-old daughter who had gone to India’s capital to catch a flight back to Los Angeles. The family landed back in California on Tuesday, where a close friend picked them up at the airport and is hosting them in Santa Monica. Their friends generously provided them a car to use, along with toiletries and other supplies.

“We were not here to get any of our things. Everything went up with the house,” Ms Misra, who is still processing the staggering loss, told The National. “It is absolutely devastating.”

Ms Misra and her husband have not been able to visit the charred remains of their home. They plan to meet an insurance adjuster next week, and are looking for places to rent as they weigh their options to rebuild. Architects by training, the husband-and-wife team are offering their services pro bono to others impacted by the fire.

They are also offering to help find a temporary campus for Palisades Charter High School, which was damaged in the fire. Having previously founded a school in Los Angeles, the couple are well-versed in the city’s complex zoning codes.

The high school is one of at least a dozen schools either damaged or destroyed.

“It is like a war zone,” she said. “We only feel our privilege when we lose something. It is a reminder to all of us to be thankful for what we have, but also to offer our services.”

With majestic ocean views and proximity to Santa Monica and Hollywood, the Pacific Palisades is an affluent neighbourhood home to celebrities, retirees, and professionals from a diverse mix of backgrounds, including a contingent from India.

Ms Misra belongs to a neighbourhood book club with a dozen other Indian Americans who read authors from their homeland. All but one of them lost their homes. The book club has become a support group for the fire victims, who are living this nightmare together.

Moira Shourie was more fortunate. Her home in the Palisades is still standing. Once owned by 20th century entertainer Lawrence Welk, the single-family house borders a network of trails. Having lived through previous fires in the region, Ms Shourie’s family was prepared. They evacuated their house in the middle of the night at the first signs of trouble.

“We knew these fires move very quickly, so we were out of there,” she said.

Now she is holed up in a hotel in downtown Los Angeles with her husband, two of her four children, two dogs, and two cats. The hotel room would be even more crowded but one of the children is away at university and another is travelling in Spain.

The family’s house easily could have burnt, she said. She and her neighbours were able to see a small fire on an isolated property next door through their homes’ security cameras. They informed a nearby fire crew, which was able to extinguish the blaze.

Technology played a crucial role during the chaotic event, she noted.

One neighbour was able to remotely access his parked Tesla to turn on its video cameras and communicate to first responders in the neighbourhood, according to Ms Shourie.

While the house was spared, fierce gusts blew her family’s front door open. “What we are dealing with now is trying to determine the ash and smoke damage,” she said.

There are no utilities or potable water at the residence either. Retardant that fire crews dropped on the surrounding land also must be cleaned up before many residents will feel safe returning home and letting their children and pets play in the neighbourhood.

The Pacific Palisades is a tight-knit community that revolved around a recreation centre and library. When her children were younger, Ms Shourie was a board member at Marquez Charter Elementary School, which was severely damaged in the fire. Her youngest children now attend St Matthews Parish School, which also suffered heavy damage.

St Matthew’s Parish School was celebrating its 75th anniversary last week. Even though children of celebrities such as actor Tom Hanks have attended the school, Ns Shourie said it was unpretentious and welcoming to children of all backgrounds.

To support St Matthew’s, Ms Shourie, who is Catholic, fondly recalled how she and her husband, who is Hindu, hosted a gala at their house several years ago with an Indian theme: the Maharaja’s Ball. “There is a real family atmosphere at the school,” she said.

As multiple unchecked fires scattered across Los Angeles wrap up their second week of ruin, anecdotes of heroism and kindness are being celebrated throughout the city. The fires have killed 27 people so far, authorities said.

Los Angeles resident Victoria Orlin phoned her estate agent at 4.30am on January 7 as she worried about their Riviera home at the edge of the Santa Monica Mountains.

“I told him I’m going to need a rental,” she joked.

Luckily, Ms Orlin won’t be renting. Zac Mostame, an estate agent, climbed out of bed and went to the Riviera where he battled the blaze with a garden hose. Mr Mostame, Ms Orlin, and Ms Orlin’s husband did their best to defend the house as well as three of their neighbours’ homes, one of which is a lavish estate owned by comedian Conan O’Brien.

“The wind and fire kept getting crazier,” Mr Mostame said. “The wind was carrying large embers down from the mountains and throwing them on the grass and ficus trees.”

Those fires were burning in back yards, where they were’t easily seen from the street.

After calling 911 and doing what they could with the little resources they had, Mr Mostame said they flagged down a fire engine, which saved the row of houses on Amalfi Drive.

“We had smoke in our eyes. I coughed for three days non-stop,” Mr Mostame told The National.

Vishal Narayan, a former fireman who founded a charitable organisation called The Good Karma Los Angeles during the Covid-19 pandemic, has also been busy.

He and his team of 15 volunteers have been delivering food, water, and care kits with toiletries, socks and N95 masks to first-responders and others impacted by the fires.

Mr Narayan said he has delivered thousands of care kits since the fire began. It is one of many acts of selflessness that has consumed Los Angeles just as quickly as the fires.

He said he hopes the random acts of kindness will continue. “This type of support is needed all the time,” Mr Narayan said. “We need to band together more often.”