Southern California Wildfires Trigger Mass Evacuations (Full Transcript)

Speaker 1: the new wildfire in Southern California. More than 50,000 people were forced to flee under an evacuation warning. Let's go to chief national correspondent Matt gum and on the scene at the new fire that broke out overnight. Good morning, Matt. Hey, good morning, George. I want to give you a sense of where we are. That overpass, that's the 405 freeway, one of the most traffic thoroughfares in the world and over here beyond the fire hoses in that black, that's where the fire burned at the top of that ridge. That is Bel Air. And over the past 24 hours, it has felt that so many fires erupted at almost the same time. But firefighters arrived here in enormous numbers on the ground, in the air, knocking that fire down overnight. A new fire breaking out in Los Angeles along the 405 freeway near the Getty Center Museum, prompting evacuation warnings in parts of Bel Air flames and embers shooting up the hillside. Our station KBC capturing the first water drop as an army of fire trucks tackled the fire from the ground. That is more than 4000 firefighters raced to battle the quick moving huge

Speaker 2: fire just north of Los Angeles. We have the fire burning the high rate of speed. It is crossing the road at Lake Hughes. The fire fueled by those dangerous

Speaker 1: Santa Ana winds burning more than 9000 acres of bone dry brush in the town of Castaic at one point devouring 30 acres per minute. The weather is what's predominantly driving this fire and it's spread right now. Multiple fires igniting on Wednesday in southern California, seemingly at the same time, firefighters trying to put out the fire behind me. It started in that car that managed to get the car fire under control right off the 405. But all these trees keep igniting and in the background, just over my left shoulder is the Hughes fire in Castaic. Tens of thousands forced to leave their homes.

Speaker 2: It's emotionally exhausting, physically exhausting and just tough. At least

Speaker 1: five schools evacuating by bus load. Students rushing to safety. I was

Speaker 2: really scared because I thought I was gonna get really hurt. Residents

Speaker 1: frantically hosing down their homes, some standing on the rooftops. I'll stay here and vital it out as long as it takes fleets of aircraft battling the flames from above firefighting aircraft have been dropping water right there. Those flames about 20 ft tall right here. You have these bulldozers that have been trying to carve a line of fire break here just as that fire seems out of control here. The fire closing California's main north south I five freeway, forcing its closure for hours overnight, backing up traffic for miles. And so just a few minutes ago we saw arson investigators here on the scene that as red flag warnings are set to persist throughout the rest of the day, there are going to be winds gusting up to 50 MPH in many locations in southern California, and there is a new threat looming over the weekend rain. You think that might be a good thing, but it also might mean mudslides over

Speaker 2: those burn scars. Robin, that is so true. All right, man, our thanks to you.