In a matter of hours, entire blocks of the Los Angeles area were destroyed, gutting thriving communities and leaving ...

PHOTOS: Powerful images show destruction ... Strong winds that sent wildfires ripping through the mountains and foothills around Los Angeles fed a spectacle of smoke, flames and flight.

Photos taken of the Hughes Fire around Castaic Lake, California captured the massive blaze and cloud of smoke visible from Six Flags Magic Mountain.

In Los Angeles’s chaparral-covered ecosystem, wildfires in the mountains are an annual ritual. But when those fires leaped into residential neighborhoods this week, killing at least 11 people and ...