The Getty fire that sent thousands of Westside residents fleeing was started by a tree branch that fell on power lines, Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti said Tuesday evening.

Video footage shows the branch breaking off a eucalyptus tree and sparking the fire in the 1900 block of North Sepulveda Boulevard, Garcetti said.

The power lines are operated by the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, according to a fire official. The agency said it was cooperating with the investigation.


DWP general manager Marty Adams, who appeared alongside Garcetti at a Tuesday news event, said the utility had cleared brush along the Sepulveda Pass in July. The DWP also said in a statement that there was “no failure of electrical equipment.”

Garcetti said the branch came from outside of the clearance area and the incident “was an act of God.”

The fire was 15% contained as of Tuesday afternoon.

Firefighters are bracing for worsening wind conditions that could hamper their efforts to tamp down the Getty fire. The National Weather Service issued a rare “extreme red flag warning” for Southern California through Thursday evening, saying winds could top 80 mph.


The Getty fire broke out shortly after 1:30 a.m. Monday along the 405 Freeway near the Getty Center and spread to the south and west, rapidly burning more than 600 acres and halting traffic on the 405 Freeway.

1 / 25 Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti, L.A. City Councilman Mike Bonin and California Gov. Gavin Newsom look at a home along Tigertail Road in Brentwood burned by the Getty fire. (Wally Skalij/Los Angeles Times) 2 / 25 California Gov. Gavin Newsom, from left, with Los Angeles City Councilman Mike Bonin and L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti tour a home along Tigertail Road in Brentwood on Tuesday that was burned by the Getty fire. The National Weather Service issued a rare “extreme red flag warning” for Southern California through Thursday evening, saying winds could top 80 mph and be the strongest in more than a decade. (Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times) 3 / 25 Traffic on the 405 Freeway flows as flames roar up a steep hillside near the Getty Center in Los Angeles. The Getty fire has forced evacuations and burned more than 600 acres. (Mel Melcon / Los Angeles Times) 4 / 25 The Getty fire broke out shortly before 2 a.m. Monday along the 405 Freeway near the Getty Center and spread to the south and west, threatening thousands of homes in Brentwood and other Westside hillside communities. (KTLA) 5 / 25 Firefighters try to save a home from the Getty fire on Tigertail Road in Los Angeles on Monday morning. (Christian Monterrosa/Associated Press) 6 / 25 A firefighting aircraft drops fire retardant on the Getty fire in Mandeville Canyon near the Brentwood Heights neighborhood of Los Angeles. (Brian van der Brug/Los Angeles Times) 7 / 25 A man walks past a burning home during the Getty fire in Los Angeles on Monday morning. (Christian Monterrosa/Associated Press) 8 / 25 The sun rises over smoke-filled canyons above the Getty Center and a burned home on Tigertail Road as the Getty fire burns in Los Angeles. (Brian van der Brug/Los Angeles Times) 9 / 25 Firefighters head out for brush work along Sepulveda Boulevard in the Sepulveda Pass as the Getty fire as it burns in Los Angeles. (Brian van der Brug/Los Angeles Times) 10 / 25 Firefighters try to save a home on Tigertail Road during the Getty fire in Los Angeles on Monday morning. (Christian Monterrosa/Associated Press) 11 / 25 Firefighters work heavy brush along Sepulveda Boulevard in the Sepulveda Pass as the Getty fire burns in Los Angeles. (Brian van der Brug/Los Angeles Times) 12 / 25 A firefighter sprays down hot spots on a home along the 12000 block of Sky Lane on Monday in Los Angeles. (Gary Coronado/Los Angeles Times) 13 / 25 From left, Betsy Landis, 90, and her neighbor Nola Hyland, 79, who both evacuated from their homes at the end of Mandeville Canyon, talk with Rochelle Linnetz inside the Westwood Recreation Center on Sepulveda Boulevard that was turned into an evacuation center. (Mel Melcon / Los Angeles Times) 14 / 25 An L.A. firefighter keeps down flames at a burned home in the 1100 block of Tigertail Road in the Brentwood Heights neighborhood of Los Angeles. (Brian van der Brug/Los Angeles Times) 15 / 25 Alex Holbrook, a student emergency medical technician at UCLA, talks with Sylvia Snow, 95, inside the Westwood Recreation Center on Sepulveda Boulevard, which was turned into an evacuation center. (Mel Melcon / Los Angeles Times) 16 / 25 The sun rises over a smoke-filled canyon above the Getty museum as the Getty fire burns in Los Angeles. (Brian van der Brug/Los Angeles Times) 17 / 25 L.A. Fire Department arson team conducts an investigation near a utility pole of a possible area of origin of the Getty fire along the 1700 block of North Sepulveda Boulevard. (Gary Coronado/Los Angeles Times) 18 / 25 Barn manager Stephanie Nagler leads a horse named Howie Doin to a horse trailer while helping to evacuate around 120 horses from the Sullivan Canyon Equestrian Community near the intersection of Rivera Ranch Road and Sunset Boulevard in Brentwood. (Mel Melcon / Los Angeles Times) 19 / 25 A helicopter makes a drop on the Getty fire, which was threatening thousands of homes in Brentwood and other hillside communities on the Westside of Los Angeles on Monday morning. (Gray Coronado/Los Angeles Times) 20 / 25 Aerial view of homes shrouded in smoke from the Getty fire. (KTLA) 21 / 25 Barn manager Stephanie Nagler, left, holds a rabbit named Chi Chi while helping to evacuate animals, mostly horses, from the Sullivan Canyon Equestrian Community near the intersection of Riviera Ranch Road and Sunset Boulevard in Brentwood. (Los Angeles Times) 22 / 25 Firefighters work the Getty fire as it burns homes along Tigertail Road in the Brentwood Heights neighborhood of Los Angeles. (Brian van der Brug/Los Angeles Times) 23 / 25 Los Angeles firefighters mop up after a home was destroyed by the Getty fire along Tigertail Road in Los Angeles. (Gary Coronado/Los Angeles Times) 24 / 25 Firefighters work in heavy brush along Sepulveda Boulevard in the Sepulveda Pass as the Getty fire burns in Los Angeles. (Brian van der Brug/Los Angeles Times) 25 / 25 A firefighter watches flames approach the Mandeville Canyon neighborhood during the Getty fire on Monday morning. (Christian Monterrosa/Associated Press)

About 600 DWP customers in the Getty fire area remained without power on Tuesday.

At about 3:19 a.m. Monday, the utility took three circuits out of service, resulting in 2,600 customers losing power in Bel-Air, Brentwood and Westwood. One of the circuits is still de-energized. The other two have been turned back on, said Carol Tucker, a spokeswoman for the utility.


Los Angeles Fire Chief Ralph Terrazas said that, despite firefighters’ efforts, twelve structures, including homes on Tigertail Road, have been destroyed in the blaze. Five others were damaged. Some homes that were destroyed were adjacent to properties that didn’t sustain any damage at all, he said.

“They were literally overwhelmed,” Terrazas said of crews fighting the fire within neighborhoods. “They had to make some tough decisions on which houses they were able to protect. Many times, it depends upon where the ember lands.”

The neighborhoods around the Sepulveda Pass have seen more than their share of fires over the years — and residents say they know to be on guard.


In the hills surrounding Danny Cahn’s home, fires have a history of blazing out of control. In 1961, when Cahn was a preschooler, residents had to flee an inferno that swept through Bel-Air and Brentwood, destroying 484 homes.

Cahn, 62, said life had never quite been the same since the “big one” roared though, propelled by Santa Ana winds that left a number of L.A.'s rich and famous homeless.

“There’s always a threat hanging in the air around here,” said the retired film editor, who was taking photos Monday of aircraft dropping pink retardant and water on flames about half a mile away. “I can recall six or seven major fires in my lifetime.

“When the smoke clears and the fires are out,” he said, “it’ll be a wonderful place to live — until the next wildfire.”


Unlike Pacific Gas & Electric and Southern California Edison, the state’s largest power providers, the DWP does not shut off service to customers before or during a wind event, in part because the utility covers an urban area.

“Our systems are completely different,” Andrew Kendall, senior assistant manager of the DWP’s power system, said at a board meeting earlier this month. “We have a 465-square-mile service territory. PG&E’s is 70,000 square miles, Edison is 50,000 square miles.”

Kendall said the DWP is “in an area where we’re no more than a five- to seven-minute LAFD response. So right now, at this time and based on previous history, we don’t feel we’re at a point where it’s prudent to do a shutdown.”


The utility has said it avoids doing routine work on fire-prone days or using tools that could spark blazes in vulnerable areas. The DWP also regularly prunes vegetation and trees near its power lines. The utility has said it maintains a database of more than 400,000 trees and prunes 185,000 of them each year.

DWP officials discussed the utility’s fire vulnerabilities and the rising cost of insurance premiums at a City Council committee hearing in August.

“Insurers look at California as a wildfire risk,” said Larry Chatman, risk manager at the DWP.

Times staff writer Mark Puente and Joseph Serna contributed to this report.