Sorting fact from fiction on the LA fires: Looting, Biden visit, cause, Hollywood sign
A series of historically devastating wildfires burning across the Los Angeles area has prompted a wave of misinformation on social media, including false and misleading claims about the firefight, the cause of the fires and the fate of local landmarks.
By Jan. 10, more than 10,000 homes, businesses and other structures had been damaged or destroyed. At least 10 people had been killed, according to the Los Angeles County Department of Medical Examiner. About 180,000 people were under evacuation orders, and another 200,000 were under advisories to be ready to evacuate, Los Angeles County Sheriff Robert Luna said.
The situation is ongoing, but here's what we know about some of the claims spreading widely online and others we expect to spread over the coming days and weeks.
Related: Debunking false claims about US drone sightings | Fact check roundup
Claim: Video shows ‘looters' during California wildfires
See this claim on social media (direct link, archive link)
There is no looting taking place in this video posted to Threads, and the post provides no evidence to support the claim. In an interview with a Los Angeles television station, the woman who lives in the house identified the men as acquaintances of hers who were helping her flee the approaching fires by taking her belongings to a safer location.
The number on the house – located at 161 West Woodbury Road in Altadena, California – is visible in both the Threads video and in the news story, in which the reporter says at one point, “The folks who live here and their friends emptied this house out of a bunch of their stuff, just in case the fire got here.”
Full fact check: Viral video shows men helping woman flee California wildfires, not 'looters'
The man shown on Threads carrying white bags along Woodbury Road is shown in the news footage walking through the front door of the home and is dressed identically in a navy blue hooded sweatshirt and gray athletic pants. The man in the red sweatsuit, who can be seen carrying the television in the Threads post, appears moments later in the news broadcast as part of the crowd of people identified by the occupant of the house as her friends and family members who were helping her comply with an evacuation order.
“They told us to leave, and we got what we could,” the woman said during the broadcast. “We’re trying to get our stuff.”
-Joedy McCreary
Claim: Biden visit grounded firefighting aircraft
See this claim on social media (direct link, archive link)
Conspiracy theorist Alex Jones claimed in a viral X post that President Joe Biden’s administration closed Los Angeles airspace to firefighting aircraft during Biden’s visit to the area. But that’s false, according to the Federal Aviation Administration.
“Pilots conducting firefighting operations could fly in the restricted airspace provided they coordinate beforehand with air traffic control,” a spokesperson told Paste BN.
The temporary flight restriction put in place for Biden’s visit reiterated as much, saying that emergency and life-saving aircraft had to coordinate with air traffic control to “avoid potential delays.”
Full fact check: No, Biden administration didn't block firefighting aircraft during LA visit
Firefighting aircraft were grounded on the evening of Jan. 7 because of strong winds in the area.
–BrieAnna Frank
Claim: Photo shows Los Angeles Fire Department leadership team
See this claim on social media (direct link, archive link)
The original image of the three women in the Facebook post, which didn't include the fiery background, was posted on the Los Angeles Fire Department’s Flickr account in February 2016. It shows, from left to right, Fire Chief Kristin Crowley, Training and Support Bureau Commander Jaime Brown and Equity and Human Resources Bureau Deputy Chief Kristine Larson.
But that isn’t the department’s entire leadership team, as the post implies, or even a significant portion of it. The department’s website lists 14 leadership positions, though two appear to be unfilled. Crowley, Brown and Larson are the only women listed among those on the leadership team.
Full fact check: Image of three LA Fire Department leaders is missing context
-Chris Mueller
Claim: Image shows directed energy weapons (DEW) caused 2025 wildfires in Los Angeles
See this claim on social media (direct link, archive link)
This claim is wrong on several fronts.
The image predates the fires burning in Southern California by more than six years. It shows a McDonald's restaurant that was destroyed by the 2018 Camp Fire in the Northern California town of Paradise. The image, taken by a photographer for The Associated Press, was featured in news reports about the older fire.
There is also no evidence that directed energy weapons started the wildfires in Los Angeles. The causes of the fires – Palisades, Eaton, Hurst, Lidia, Sunset and Kenneth – remained under investigation as of Jan. 9, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, the state's firefighting agency.
Directed energy weapons use concentrated electromagnetic energy to damage or destroy enemy targets, according to the U.S. Government Accountability Office. These weapons have repeatedly – and falsely – been linked to high-profile fires over the years. Paste BN debunked similar claims about wildfires in Hawaii and Texas.
A broken electrical transmission line caused the 2018 fire in Paradise.
–Andre Byik
Claim: Image shows Hollywood Sign 'covered by fire'
See this claim on social media (direct link, archive link)
While the park surrounding the landmark was closed as a precaution, "the sign itself is not affected and is secure," Jeff Zarrinnam, who chairs the nonprofit Hollywood Sign Trust, told Paste BN in a Jan. 9 email. In a Facebook post shared later that day, the trust called the image a fabrication.
The sign was not in the evacuation zone as of that day, Paste BN reported. Rather, the active fire closest to the sign was more than 2 miles from it, according to an interactive map of the fires published by the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. The BBC reported Jan. 9 that the fires were “approaching” the sign, not that they reached it.
Full fact check: Was Hollywood Sign surrounded by fire? No, this image is fabricated
Walter Scheirer, an engineering professor at the University of Notre Dame whose area of research includes visual recognition, described the Threads image as "fake" in an email to Paste BN. Hive Moderation, which can detect if generative AI was used to create an image, determined it was 87% likely to contain AI-generated content, with a high probability the specific tool used was Stable Diffusion XL and an "inpainting" technique that allows selected parts of the image to be edited.
–Joedy McCreary
Claim: The Los Angeles Fire Department asked 'anyone with firefighting experience' to assist with wildfires
See this claim on social media (direct link, archive link)
The Los Angeles Fire Department asked off-duty members to call its communications department with their availability to assist in combating the fires in a Jan. 7 X post. It's the first time in nearly two decades the department has done so, spokesperson Margaret Stewart told KCAL-TV in Los Angeles.
But the department was not requesting outside assistance, contrary to the claim. It reiterated that only its own personnel were being asked to help in subsequent posts on another one of its X accounts.
Full fact check: Los Angeles Fire Department asked off-duty members to help combat wildfires
"The (Los Angeles Fire Department) is running a recall for our OWN members and not anyone else," reads one of the posts, which referred to the online claims to the contrary as "misinformation."
–BrieAnna J. Frank
Claims: Wildfires were set intentionally, with planned burns
Claims in this vein surfaced after a wave of wildfires that swept across Canada in 2023 and in California a year earlier.
Those assertions miss a key point. Planned ignitions are used to slow fires – not start them. Those intentional, controlled fires effectively act as a firebreak by eliminating the fuel of the existing fire – leaving it with nothing to burn.
"The goal is to remove the majority of available fuel ahead of the wildfire so there’s less fuel available for the wildfire to burn," British Columbia Wildfire Service spokesperson Jean Strong told Paste BN in 2023.
A similar tactic has been used as a preventive measure in California to minimize the threat from accidental fires. The U.S. Forest Service paused that practice "for the forseeable future" in October 2024, in a move to preserve staff and resources for fighting wildfires, according to a report from California National Public Radio affiliate KQED-FM.
Full fact check: Viral helicopter video shows planned ignition to mitigate wildfire in Canada
Full fact check: Helicopter setting fire to trees was slowing wildfire, not setting one
Full fact check: California uses controlled burns to mitigate wildfires
– Joedy McCreary
California fires have destroyed homes owned by Paris Hilton, Billy Crystal, Anna Faris
In the wake of the Maui fires in 2023, social media users wrongly implied that the Hawaiian estate of former President Barack Obama and former first lady Michelle Obama was suspiciously spared, tapping into baseless conspiracy theories about natural disasters being planned. The Obamas’ property was on Oahu, a separate island 100 miles from the fires.
The fires burning in the Los Angeles area have already claimed the homes of multiple celebrities, including Paris Hilton, who said she saw her Malibu home "burn to the ground on live TV" in an X post.
The Pacific Palisades home of actor Billy Crystal also burned down, he said in a statement shared with Paste BN.
"Words cannot describe the enormity of the devastation we are witnessing and experiencing," he said. "We ache for our friends and neighbors who have also lost their homes and businesses in this tragedy."
Other stars whose homes burned include Anna Faris, Ricki Lake and Los Angeles Lakers Coach JJ Redick.
–Andre Byik
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This story was updated to add information.