A synagogue with more than 100 years of history in Pasadena, California, burned down overnight as fires swept across parts of Southern California.
The fate of a Chabad center about 40 miles away near the coast was unclear as a major fire flared in the Pacific Palisades, one of three different blazes destroying structures and threatening lives in multiple pockets of the greater Los Angeles area. Additional Jewish institutions lay in evacuation zones, while others took preparations in case of further spread.
The Pasadena Jewish Center and Temple burned for hours as fire spilled out of the Eaton Canyon, fueled by strong winds. The 434-family congregation had operated from the Mission-style building, which had a wooden Torah ark carved by the Jewish artist Peter Krasnow, and three outbuildings since the 1940s.
“It’s a massive center, it’s just crumbling with the intensity of the heat,” a KTLA reporter said while broadcasting from the scene. She added, as flames shot through the synagogue’s roof, “It looks like the concrete and the metal is just melting. … It’s just a total loss.”
Added a neighborhood man whom the newscaster said used to go to the synagogue, “I feel numb to this. It’s like a bad bad horrific dream. To see that it’s not going to be here tomorrow … ” His voice broke.
The newscaster, Tracy Leong, showed fire trucks driving past the synagogue but said she had not seen any attempt to quell its burning while she was on the scene. “It’s really hard to get a handle on this fire,” she said. “There are so many structures burning and they’re doing what they can, and there’s just not enough of them right now.”
The congregation’s executive director told The New York Times overnight that everyone employed by the synagogue was safe.
“We are devastated, but our staff are safe and we managed to get our Torahs out safely as well, while ash was coming down in our parking lot,” said Melissa Levy, who said she had been evacuated from her own home.
Southern California has long been vulnerable to devastating fires, but climate change has altered weather patterns that in the past largely limited fire season to only parts of the year.
Earlier in the night, the Pasadena fire was not the major one on the radar for residents of the region. A larger fire in the Pacific Palisades, located on the Pacific coast north of Santa Monica, was under an evacuation order as strong winds spread a fire there. A third fire later erupted several miles north.
Zibby Owens, the publisher and bookseller who recently put out an anthology titled “On Being Jewish Now,” posted footage on Instagram showing that her family’s home in the area had been lapped by flames before losing its camera feed.
Kehillat Israel, a Reconstructionist synagogue in Pacific Palisades, was also under an evacuation order and closed starting on Tuesday.
And the Chabad of Pacific Palisades evacuated 100 children from its preschool on Tuesday as fire neared the property, Rabbi Zushe Cunin told local TV news. He and other rabbis posed with the community’s Torahs as they removed them from the fire’s path on Tuesday evening.
“The night is still a very long one, and the winds are still raging,” the center said on Instagram. “We need all of your prayers to overcome this dangerous fire.”
The center is located squarely inside the evacuation zone for the Palisades Fire. None of the three fires was contained on Wednesday morning, with continued strong winds expected to fuel them throughout the day.
On the other side of Topanga State Park from Pacific Palisades in Calabasas, the Reform synagogue Congregation Or Ami was taking precautions in case conditions changed.
“We have removed Torah scrolls and other sacred/business-critical items from Congregation Or Ami. It’s without power now. We have people whose homes are endangered, people who have friends/relatives who lost homes. In a holding pattern for the moment,” Rabbi Paul Kipnes wrote on Facebook on Thursday, noting that the Palisades fire was just 17 miles away with winds gusting up to 100 miles per hour at times. “Distances here feel large yet small.”
