Photo Essay | Laguna Niguel fire destroys coastal homes

 Firefighters meet the forces of nature as a wildland fire is still being contained five days after ignition

The late afternoon sun illuminates the remains of a mansion on Coronado Pointe that the Coastal Fire burned down the night before. Photos by DANIEL PEARSON, Photo Editor. 

The air was heavy and difficult to breathe as smoke billowed out of the Coronado Pointe street in Laguna Niguel May 12; the multi-million dollar neighborhood had just gone up in flames the day before. 

According to Fire Captain Sean Doran, public information officer with the Orange County Fire Authority, a brush fire started down in Aliso Woods Canyon May 11 at about 2:44 p.m. The initial 911 call stated there was a small section of vegetation on fire in the canyon between Laguna Niguel and Laguna Beach.

A firefighter looks through the remains of an elaborate archway, the only part of this house left standing.

The fire, simply dubbed the Coastal Fire, quickly grew to about 200 acres and rushed up the hillsides of Aliso Canyon, taking direct aim of the Coronado Pointe neighborhood in Laguna Niguel. 

While it burned through the canyon Wednesday evening, smoke billowed high into the sky, visible even from as far away as Orange.

A firefighter works on putting out some remaining hotspots in the ruins of a house in Coronado Pointe May 12.

“Our objective was to keep that fire in the canyon and basically outflank it on both sides,” Doran told The Panther. “But with the fuels (and with) the vegetation out here being super dry, (the canyon) was basically ready to be ignited and sustain fire. Combined with the winds and the slope makes for a bad, dangerous situation.”

Firefighters soak a recently scarred hillside with fire retardant to prevent any further progress of the fire from this front.

The Coastal Fire destroyed over 20 homes in less than 24 hours. 

According to Doran, after the fire met the Coronado Point neighborhood the main objective changed from fighting wildland fire to fighting structural fire. 

“Our job at that point is to prevent the house-to-house ignition and to not lose more any more homes as each ignites,” Doran said.

A firefighter assesses a home that had been untouched by flames directly next door to a mansion that had been completely leveled in the Coronado Pointe neighborhood May 12.

Doran said this fire is unique in its demand for two types of fire fighting to combat it. 

“There’s almost two fronts here,” Doran said. “We have the wildland fire still down there, where we are working on the perimeter and containment, and then we have a whole other issue up here with structural firefighting. So it is a unique combination of having both.”

The burnt skeleton of a Mercedes Benz sits in the driveway of a house that burned the night before.

A firefighter takes a brief breather while fighting the Coastal Fire in the Coronado Pointe neighborhood May 12.

Although this fire seems like a unique urban wildland phenomenon that took the Laguna Niguel community by surprise, natural disasters such as the Coastal Fire are only going to become more frequent threats to urban areas over the years.

Two firefighters assess the damage of the Coastal Fire to the Coronado Pointe neighborhood May 12.

According to a report by the National Fire Protection Association, the number of wildland fires rose 17% from 2019 to 2020. 

Major fires in the California wildland/urban interface, such as the Coastal Fire in Laguna Niguel, caused $4.2 billion in direct property damage in 2020 alone. This is a 150% increase in damages from 2019.

A firefighter finishes extinguishing a mansion that had been completely leveled by the Coastal Fire in the Coronado Pointe neighborhood May 12.

Firefighters like those who responded to the Coastal fire in Laguna Niguel will have their work cut out for them going into the unforeseen future as global temperatures continue to rise and mass wildfires become more prevalent.

The entire Coronado Pointe road was shut down May 12 as the street was filled with firefighters preventing any further spread of the fire into Laguna Niguel. According to Orange County Fire Authority, during the peak of fire activity May 13, there were a total of 456 firefighters on scene. 

Although there was no projection to fully contain the fire the same day, Doran emphasized the importance of containing the fire quickly.

“Every foot we put in, every fire line, is an area of containment,” Doran said.

A fire truck sits in front of the remains of a house that was destroyed in Coronado Pointe. 
The Coastal Fire is at 90% containment as of the morning of Monday, May 16. A total of 200 acres have burned, but no deaths have been reported. Officials are still searching for the cause of the blaze.