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 destroying thousands of homes,

Fires raging in the Los Angeles area have reduced some 10,000 structures to ash and rubble, killed at least 10, displaced thousands of others and spread over an area larger than the size of San Francisco.

By Jorge Garcia, Rollo Ross and Maria Alejandra Cardona LOS ANGELES (Reuters) -Firefighters finally started gaining control over two major wildfires on the eastern and western flanks of Los Angeles on Friday as fierce winds that supercharged the fires for days finally eased.