The last thing Anthony Mitchell Sr. told his eldest son was that he was still waiting for an ambulance as the swiftly moving Eaton fire bore down on his Altadena home.
“He called everybody and said ‘I’m OK, I’m just waiting to be evacuated,’” the junior Mitchell said of their 5 a.m. phone call. “He probably knew nobody was coming, but he wanted to keep everybody at ease.”
The great-grandfather and Mitchell family patriarch was an amputee who used a wheelchair. His son Justin Mitchell had cerebral palsy and needed help to get out of bed. They couldn’t escape on their own, and relatives said firefighters stopped them from entering the evacuation zone.
“He probably could have gotten up and walked away, but he’s not gonna leave my brother,” Mitchell said. “My father would never leave any of his kids. His children were his legacy.”
So the pair huddled together awaiting a rescue that never came, becoming two of the first victims of the unprecedented firestorms still raging across L.A. County. At least 11 people have died in the disaster, officials said Friday.
“What hurts the most is that our state didn’t prepare for this at all,” Mitchell said.
Officials have known for years that disabled Californians are disproportionately likely to die in wildfires. The state released a scathing audit in 2019 detailing how emergency management agencies and other first responders were unprepared for the threat.
At that time, about 4 million Californians were estimated to be disabled, including almost a quarter million Angelenos under 65.
Many say they feel even more vulnerable now.
“You feel helpless,” said actress and singer Joci Scott, 26, a wheelchair-user in North Hollywood. “Evacuation procedures usually forget people with disabilities. It’s a lot more difficult for us.”
Black residents like the Mitchells are much more likely to be disabled than white, Latino or Asian ones, data show. They were among those who cannot evacuate without help. Others, such as Scott, are reluctant to flee, knowing the tools they rely on to breathe, move, eat, bathe and go to the bathroom cannot come with them and aren’t available at most shelters.
“I have important medication I can’t go without and mobility equipment that’s very expensive and difficult to replace,” Scott said. “It’s really overwhelming.”
Even small and relatively inexpensive prescription medical goods such as urinary catheters can be onerous to find, especially in an emergency, the actress said. Yet without them, “I’m immediately at risk for kidney infection and sepsis.”
Hers is a familiar anxiety, said Germán Parodi, co-executive director of The Partnership for Inclusive Disaster Strategies and the main voice behind the Disability & Disaster Hotline, which has received calls from people fleeing the L.A. fires.
“There’s a fear of not knowing where to go, what to take with you,” he said. “The sooner that organizations like mine know the needs, the sooner I can begin making sure it’s sourced locally.”
Parodi said he has a direct line to state and federal disaster authorities. He and others also work closely with L.A’s independent living centers, which can quickly mobilize an oxygen tank or wheelchair to an Angeleno in need.
“Our centers provide disaster plans and resources,” said Renee Nash, an outreach worker with Communities Actively Living Independent and Free in downtown Los Angeles. “If people need motel vouchers, if they need access to Uber or Lyft, we do that for free.”
They can also provide battery banks to those who need to keep medical devices running while stuck without power, as thousands have been this week in L.A.
“If you’re on an oxygen concentrator or a hoyer lift, Edison has us delivering Goal Zero Yeti battery back up so you can plug in your medical device,” Nash explained. “People have said they’re working great.”
But major obstacles remain, especially when it comes to evacuations.
“They closed the roads down and nobody can get in to assist,” said Serra Rea, Disability Disaster Access and Resources program manager with the California Foundation for Independent Living.
Many disabled people don’t drive or have access to a vehicle. Others fear getting mired in gridlock and burning alive in their cars.
“We saw a couple days ago, a lot of people had to leave their cars and run for their lives,” which is not an option for some with disabilities, Rea said.
Recent malfunctions in the emergency alert system have only heightened the terror.
“I can’t just jump out of bed and run real quick — I have to find someone who’s willing to carry me down the stairs,” said Tamara Mena, a wheelchair-user in Northridge who was stuck in her apartment for days when a power shutoff downed her apartment’s elevators. “Every minute, every second counts.”
Others said they were frustrated by the lack of communication from officials.
“If people weren’t sharing these resources, I wouldn’t know about them, which I think is kind of messed up,” Scott said. “This should be widespread information already.”
The city, state and federal government have offices charged with ensuring disabled people are not left behind in disasters; each declined to make officials available for comment.
For Mitchell, the grief over losing his father and brother is tinged with fury at the way they died.
“I’m angry at what happened to my father because it shouldn’t have happened,” he said. “The institutions let him down.”
