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Raging brush fires in California are causing mass destruction, exacerbating the state's home insurance crisis.

• Wildfires are burning across Los Angeles, coating the county in smoke.
• Health agencies issued warnings and schools closed as air quality reached unsafe levels.
• Experts break down why the fine-particle pollution can cause serious, long-term damage.

Wildfires erupted across Los Angeles, coating the county in smoke, haze, and an acrid smell.

The LA Public Health department issued an air quality alert, and many schools closed due to dangerous air quality. 

The mist that hovers over wildfire sites is a collection of fine-particle pollution (PM 2.5), Dr. David Hill, a pulmonologist with the American Lung Association, told the AP. 

"We have defenses in our upper airway to trap larger particles and prevent them from getting down into the lungs. These are sort of the right size to get past those defenses," Hill said. "When those particles get down into the respiratory space, they cause the body to have an inflammatory reaction to them."

What is the risk of wildfire smoke?

Fine-particle air pollution can cause inflammation in the lungs and reduce heart function — lasting effects similar to smoking cigarettes or exposure to diesel exhaust, the New York Times reported. 

Dr. Kari Nadeau, a physician and scientist at Stanford University, told the Times she believes the risk to our health is higher than that of smoking cigarettes. "Cigarettes at least have filters," Nadeau said.

This kind of air pollution is particularly risky for children, whose lungs are still developing. 

"They breathe in more air per unit of body weight," Laura Kate Bender, the lung association's National Assistant Vice President of healthy air, told the AP.

The risk of lung and heart irritation is also higher for older adults and people with lung or cardiovascular conditions, including asthma.

6 ways to stay safe when it's smoky outside

• Keep an eye on the air quality in your area to determine how long you should exercise caution. Until the risk passes, there are easy things you can do to protect yourself from experiencing long-term lung inflammation.
• If possible, stay inside and close your windows, Hill said. (You can put your zip code into AirNow.gov to find out the air quality in your area.)
• Do not burn candles, light a fire, or smoke indoors. That increases indoor pollution, according to a blog post from epidemiologist Katelyn Jetelina, of the University of Texas Health Science Center.
• Do not vacuum. That also affects your indoor air by kicking up any fine particles that may have come in through your window or door, Jetelina said.
• If you do go outside, wear an N95 mask, which — if fitted correctly — blocks out 95% of particles larger than 0.3 microns. As such, they effectively keep out 2.5-micron particles, which we're seeing from the wildfire smoke. "N95 masks are the type of face covering protection that I would recommend for somebody who is outside during the air pollution caused by wildfires," Marina Vance, an assistant professor of mechanical engineering at the University of Colorado, Boulder, told Healthline.
• While inside, you can run your air-conditioning unit if it has a good HVAC filter, and an air purifier can help too, the American Lung Association recommends.

• Employers see AI and cybersecurity skills as some of the most important in the next few years.
• Employers expect nearly 40% of skills to change or become irrelevant by 2030, a WEF report said.
• Big data specialists and fintech engineers will likely be the fastest-growing jobs.

Employers say AI and big data proficiency are now some of the most important skills for job seekers in the next few years, according to the World Economic Forum's Future of Jobs Report.

The sweeping survey found that employers believe various tech-related skills will grow in importance the fastest, while manual dexterity and reading will decline this year. This highlights the rapid workplace transformation happening across industries.

Over 1,000 employers representing more than 14 million employees worldwide were surveyed for the report, which previews the job landscape for 2025 to 2030.

AI and big data, networks and cybersecurity, and technological literacy ranked as the three skills growing the fastest in importance. The AI boom has not only transformed Silicon Valley but also reshaped once-mundane tasks across industries, from legal research to code writing.

A Google Cloud director previously told Business Insider that cybersecurity is one of the most broadly relevant skills, with industries from agriculture to financial services seeking professionals in the space. Yet demand isn't being met, he said, and the field is here to stay.

Survey respondents said they don't anticipate that tech skills alone will be in demand. Creative thinking and resilience ranked No. 4 and No. 5, respectively, on the list of skills growing the fastest in importance.

On the flip side, employers surveyed said they believe manual dexterity, endurance, and precision will decrease in importance. Reading, writing, and mathematics also saw a small dip among respondents. Overall, employees globally can expect that nearly 40% of their current skills will drastically change or become irrelevant by 2030, according to the survey.

Compared to the World Economic Forum's previous reports, tech skills saw the biggest jump in projected importance, with AI spiking in anticipated value across almost all agencies. Though the tech industry has hit a hiring slump in recent years, tech and non-tech companies alike are eager to hire AI roles, BI previously reported.

The fastest-growing jobs in the next five years will likely be big data specialists and fintech engineers, while clerical and secretarial workers will continue to decline, according to the report. With job growth slowing and unemployed Americans staying out of work longer, economists previously told BI that 2025 will prove challenging for job hunters overall, especially those in white-collar industries.

No president gets everything right.

The New York Yankees are reportedly looking to trade pitcher Marcus Stroman and they may end up shipping him to the loaded National League West.

The Atlanta Braves may get desperate as they try to replace Charlie Morton and Max Fried in the starting pitching rotation.

The New York Mets could still use a starting center fielder for the 2025 season. Is Chicago White Sox slugger Luis Robert Jr. on their radar?

The Boston Red Sox could still look to move star first baseman Triston Casas if they get the right value in return.

The New York Yankees are reportedly looking to trade starting pitcher Marcus Stroman and they may send him back to where his career began.

Officials suspect an electrical malfunction caused the blaze.

The New York Yankees reportedly aren't interested in pursuing a Nolan Arenado trade, and the feeling is mutual.

Country music legend Garth Brooks is facing legal challenges, but he still paid tribute to his longtime friend, the late President Jimmy Carter.

Seattle Mariners hurler Luis Castillo has been linked to several teams in the rumor mill. Could he land with the Baltimore Orioles ahead of Opening Day?

Pete Alonso would be a fascinating addition for the Boston Red Sox, but one MLB insider believes a signing is unlikely.

The Titans make a surprising move, passing on getting a quarterback altogether.

• Disney Cruise Line's sixth ship, Disney Treasure, set sail in late 2024.
• Its most luxurious Tomorrow Tower Suite has a private elevator, four bedrooms, and a spiral staircase.
• The suite starts at about $57,440 for a family of four.

If you're a Disney cruise fan with a genie, consider using one of your three wishes on a stay in Disney Treasure's Tomorrow Tower Suite.

Otherwise, expect to pay more than $57,000 for the luxury marine penthouse.

Disney Cruise Line's newest ship, Disney Treasure, set sail in December 2024, marking the sixth vessel to join the entertainment powerhouse's fleet. Don't expect the company to slow down — its popular cruise arm plans to double its fleet over the next six years.

It's no wonder fans of the brand have been indulging in its floating theme parks. Treasure is filled with amenities referencing Disney films and rides.

If you fondly remember the Jungle Cruise ride, grab a drink at the themed Skipper Society lounge. If you're a "Zootopia" fan, grab an ice-cream cone from Jumbeaux's Sweets.

• China could destroy or neutralize US and allied airpower in a war with fewer shots than the other way around, a new report argues.
• China has prioritized hardening and expanding its airfields in the region at a faster rate than the US and its allies.
• The report's authors argue the US needs to prioritize defense, hardening airbases, and evolving its force.

In a war, China could suppress or destroy critical American airpower in the Indo-Pacific region with far fewer shots than it would take the US and its allies to do the same to Beijing's air forces, a new research report argues.

The report's authors note that China has been working faster than the US to harden its airbases and diversify its combat aircraft in the region, creating an imbalance in China's favor. American airfields are vulnerable to attack in a conflict, such as a fight over Taiwan.

A new Hudson Institute analysis from researchers Thomas Shugart and Timothy Walton highlights the serious threat facing US installations in the Pacific and echoes Department of Defense concerns about growing China's arsenal of missiles and those of US lawmakers about inadequate defenses.

In the report, Shugart and Walton write that China "has made major investments to defend, expand, and fortify" its airfields and more than doubled its hardened aircraft shelters and unhardened individual aircraft shelters over the past decade. China has also added to its taxiways and ramp areas. All of these efforts effectively give the Chinese military more places to protect and launch combat aircraft in a potential fight.

US efforts have been modest by comparison. And its military airfield capacity, including that of allies in the region, is roughly one-third of China's; without South Korea, that drops to one-quarter, and without the Philippines, it falls to just 15 percent.

The Air Force has been looking at dispersion and atypical runways as part of its Agile Combat Employment efforts, but there is still a notable shortfall that could be exploited.

This imbalance means it would take China far fewer missiles or airstrikes to neutralize US and allied airfields than it would the other way around, Shugart and Walton write. A preemptive strike, surprise being important in Chinese military doctrine, could catch the US and its allies off guard and give China an edge in air operations.

"Strategically, this destabilizing asymmetry risks incentivizing the PRC to exercise a first-mover advantage," the report says. "China could initiate a conflict if it sees an opportunity to nullify adversary airpower on the ramp."

Shugart wrote in 2017 that this is a real possibility, "particularly if China perceives that its attempts at deterrence of a major US intervention — say in a cross-strait Taiwan crisis or in a brewing dispute over the Senkaku Islands — have failed."

China has not been shy about its investments in being able to pull off such a strike, either. Beijing has invested heavily in its rocket force, with the Pentagon's annual report on Chinese military power documenting staggering growth in the number of stockpiled missiles and launchers, including the weapons it would need to hit US installations in the region. Satellite images have also documented mock American military assets, such as aircraft carriers, widely seen as missile targets.

For the conflicts and airpower operations in the Middle East, the US military enjoyed the ability to deploy to forward airfields uncontested, but the threat environment is different in the Pacific. A war with China would be very different.

But despite the significant concerns both within the Pentagon and Washington about vulnerabilities in US airbases, "the US military has devoted relatively little attention to countering these threats compared to its focus on developing modern aircraft," Shugart and Walton write. Older and newer aircraft differ in the air but are equally vulnerable on the ground.

The Ukraine war and ongoing fights in the Middle East have demonstrated that airfields are high-priority targets.

In order to counter the threat China poses, the Hudson report argues the US should invest further in active defenses for its air operations, harden its airfields to maintain resilience, and accelerate its efforts to field aircraft and unmanned systems that can operate from short or damaged runways or don't require runaways altogether, efforts fitting with ACE operations.

"Executing an effective campaign to enhance the resilience of US airfield operations will require informed decisions to prioritize projects — and sustained funding," Shugart and Walton write. "What is clear, however, is that US airfields do face the threat of attack, and the current DoD approach of largely ignoring this fact invites PRC aggression and risks losing a war." 

• California fires have led people to turn to apps, security cameras, and social media accounts for real-time updates.
• The Watch Duty wildfire maps app said it added over 1 million new users in recent days.
• Residents are also using security apps like Ring to check in on their homes and discuss updates in forums.

As California fires spread across the Los Angeles region, residents are turning to online resources and smartphone app communities to track the blazes and find up-to-date information on their impact.

Along with the Watch Duty wildfire maps app, people are using security apps like Google Nest and Ring to check footage of their homes and communicate in forums.

Others are sharing resources and information in subreddits and on social media platforms.

Watch Duty

Watch Duty describes itself as a wildfire mapping and alert app "powered by real people giving you real-time information vetted by trained professionals, not robots." There's also a web-based version.

Adam Wood, a 45-year-old film producer, director, and editor, living in North Hollywood, helped his friend evacuate from Pasadena and said he used the app to track the fires. He told BI it helped him assess whether his friend's area was likely to have been impacted, although they don't know if his house is still standing.

The app, which is free to use with the option to pay $25 for a yearly membership that unlocks some additional features, was developed by a nonprofit company in 2022 and isn't affiliated with a government agency. It focuses on providing real-time information about fires from sources including retired firefighters, dispatchers, and first responders.

"Our reporters undergo extensive training as well as background checks before joining our elite team," the company said on its website, adding that they "diligently radio scanners and collaborate around the clock to bring you up-to-the-minute life-saving information."

Ring and other home-security apps

Security app users have shared experiences of watching their homes being burned down from the app's camera footage.

Zibby Owens, a writer, shared to social media on Wednesday footage from her Google Nest camera of parts of her Palisades property in flames.

Some have also used the "Neighbors" forum on the Amazon-owned Ring app to share information about the fires.

"Fire close to Mandeville Canyon (photo from 9:50PM), seems to be going rapidly toward South," one user posted last night with a photo.

The app has also released information about the wildfires and dedicated a tab to resources for impacted residents called "California Wildfire Information." The page includes shelter locations, where to find food in LA County, what to pack, and wildfire smoke tips. It also links over a dozen resources including media updates, Airbnb temporary housing details, and a list of school closures.

The Ring Neighbors team also released a statement in the app about the wildfires with links to help those impacted, including organizations like The American Red Cross, the California Community Fund, and California Fire Relief.

Social media

In addition to people posting stories, photos, and videos about their experiences with the wildfire, specific accounts are also being used to inform people about up-to-date information.

Facebook users are active in groups like Calfire Updates, which has over 300,000 members. The group dedicates posts to firefighters, shares information about damage, and discusses the fires. Other groups, like California Wildfires Information ALERT, post evacuation notices and resources for those who have fled impacted areas.

Local police, fire departments, and emergency services have been sharing information on their dedicated social media pages, such as the Los Angeles Fire Department account on X or the City of Pasadena account on Facebook.

Local community forums on Reddit

People are also turning to community subreddits like r/PacificPalisades and r/Pasadena to share updates and discuss wildfire damage. Some posts have offered practical tips for evacuees, such as suggestions to film the contents of their homes before leaving for insurance purposes if they have time to do so.

One user named OnerKram17, has dedicated two days to monitoring police and fire scanners, providing frequent updates in the r/PacificPalisades subreddit in between what they said was a few hours of sleep.

Others have taken on similar roles, posting about power lines that are blocking off crossings or potentially false alarms for fires.

"Following and biting are common copulation behaviors in other species," researcher Christine Barry said.