Old Topanga Cyn Wildfire of 1993

Title: 1993 Old Topanga (Malibu) Fire

Location: Los Angeles County
Notes: On this morning in 1993 the arson-caused Old Topanga Fire began on the north slope of the Santa Monica Mountains in Los Angeles County and driven by strong Santa Ana Winds with gusts up to 70 miles per hour ran up and over the mountain range and down to the sea at Pacific Coast Highway.

Three people were killed and 369 homes were destroyed and at least 18,000 acres were scorched. One of the fatalities in this fire was Hollywood writer/director Duncan Gibbons (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0316496/) who was fatally burned when he went back to his house to rescue his cat, which ironically survived the fire despite being injured. Another irony is that Gibbons wrote the screenplay for a made-for-TV movie entitled "Third Degree Burn" which aired in 1989.

KTLA-TV's Jennifer York won an Emmy Award for her work reporting on this fire from KTLA's primary news helicopter.

A few years after this fire a couple of firefighters were falsely accused of starting this blaze while off-duty but were later cleared when their seemingly unlikely story was corroborated.

Here are some great links about this disaster:

http://www.malibucomplete.com/mc_history_malibucity_1993fire.php

http://www.lafire.com/famous_fires/931102_OldTopangaFire/110293_official_report_old_topanga_inci.htm

http://www.dasfilmfest.com/?id=94