The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power has denied allegations in a lawsuit that a worker altered a computer log to conceal a delay of nearly five hours in attempting to deenergize some electrical circuits during the Palisades fire.
LADWP spokesperson Ellen Cheng on Monday, July 14, also denied allegations that the utility failed to conduct regular inspections on an important reservoir that sat empty when the fire broke out, contributing to the lack of water for firefighters.
On the subject of the computer log, LADWP ordered a department worker at 1:40 p.m. Jan. 7 — in the early hours of the devastating fire — to deenergize circuits for Palisades Village and surrounding neighborhoods. The worker did not arrive at the substation to deenergize the circuits until 6:18 p.m., and could not complete the order because of an equipment malfunction. The worker subsequently had to flee because the fast-moving fire was approaching.
The lawsuit alleged the worker returned 22 days later and changed the arrival time to 1:47 p.m.
Cheng acknowledged the gap of four hours and 38 minutes between the time the order was given and the time the worker arrived at the substation, but said it would be a mischaracterization to call it a “delay.”
“Hard-working LADWP employees were responding to numerous requests throughout the city that day during a challenging and evolving situation,” she said.
Cheng added that changes were made to the computer log, but not by the same worker who tried to deenergize the circuits and not in an attempt to hide the gap of nearly five hours. Instead, more information and times were added to the log to give a clearer picture of what transpired, she said.
“The additional information added later was the timeline of events leading up to the evacuation to provide missing details not captured on the day of the fire,” Cheng said.
Much of the lawsuit, filed under the name “Grigsby et al,” focuses on the 117-million-gallon Santa Ynez Reservoir in Pacific Palisades, which had been drained nine months earlier and was awaiting repairs on a 160-foot tear in the cover.
The empty reservoir is believed to have contributed to the lack of water power at some fire hydrants and denied firefighting helicopters a source of water in the early efforts to contain the fire.
The suit alleges LADWP did not have a backup plan for the dry reservoir and was not doing yearly underwater inspections of the cover as required by its own policy and state regulations. The damage was discovered in early 2024, three years after its last inspection, according to the lawsuit.
But in a statement Monday, Cheng said: “Allegations that LADWP failed to meet its inspection schedule are without merit.”
Monthly inspections were done on the reservoir until it was taken offline in 2024, she said. Those inspections included dive inspections in 2020, 2021 and 2023. A dive inspection was unnecessary in 2022 due to repairs being completed that same year, Cheng said.
Alexander Robertson, one of the lawyers who filed the suit on behalf of 3,300 victims, responded: “We stand by our allegations. They are based on DWP’s own documents and the evidence speaks for itself.”
The lawsuit alleges LADWP exacerbated the fire by running out of water at some hydrants and allegedly sparking other spot fires that contributed to the main blaze. The fire destroyed nearly 7,000 homes and businesses and killed 12 people.