Google Maps Saves Lives

Google Maps Saves Lives

As 5,000 firefighters race to combat two 5,000-acre blazes in the San Fernando Valley, officials with the Los Angeles Fire Department worried that the fires could race across 15 miles of homes, all the way to the Pacific Ocean. So in order to best inform residents how close the fires are to their homes, the L.A. Fire Department has plotted the blazes on Google Maps. Here's the Sesnon fire, and here's the nearby Marek fire, along with evacuation maps.

(Photograph of L.A. wildfire by by David McNew/Getty Images)

 

 

  • Chris Thompson is a writer living in Brooklyn.