The comedian Bill Burr unleashed his fury at unqualified critics of Los Angeles’ response to devastating fires when he appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live on Tuesday night.
The 56-year-old stand-up star said right off the bat that he though ‘everybody did a great job’ in combating the fires, which included major blazes in LA’s Pacific Palisades neighborhood and Altadena, which borders Pasadena.
But he didn’t think ‘the internet’ and its commentators did anything to help with the fire response.
Burr — who also raged at insurance companies for profiting on people’s misery — called out ‘all of these “fire experts”‘ and mocked their attempts to outsmart local officials.
‘Why didn’t you just fly a helicopter into the ocean? And then just, f***in’…’ he said in a mocking voice before trailing off.
‘I don’t know, because there were 100-knot winds?’ Burr continued as he shut down complaints that helicopters weren’t being used enough in the initial hours of the fire fight. ‘You wanna do that at night? You f***ing lunatic.’
The comedian Bill Burr, 56, unleashed his fury at unqualified critics of Los Angeles’ response to devastating fires when he appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live on Tuesday night
At least 25 people have died as a result of the LA fires, and more than 180,000 people have been forced to evacuate. LA Mayor Karen Bᴀss and California Governor Gavin Newsom have been heavily criticized over the response to the fires; a home burns in Altadena on January 8
The winds on the first night of the fires had gusts reaching as high as 80 to 100mph, which would have been dangerous for low-lying planes or helicopters try to extinguish the fires.
Burr also seemed to allude to some half-baked claims from social media users that firefighters should have been using water from the Pacific Ocean to fight the flames after failing pumping systems and poor water pressure from immediate overuse hampered efforts to drown out the fires.
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Although water delivery initially suffered, there wasn’t a shortage of water, and dropping mᴀssive amounts of seawater on the fires would have destroyed the land by salting it and possibly even tainting groundwater.
Burr continued to mock the Monday-morning quarterbacks by reciting one of their commonly used phrased: ‘This was definitely mismanaged.’
‘That’s a big word we’re hearing now,’ Kimmel said of the ‘mismanagement’ claims.
‘Mismanaged?!’ Burr continued. ‘Like some f***ing idiot on the internet knows how to manage the worst fire in LA, sitting there in his underwear.’
Burr mentioned during the segment that his family had to evacuate their home, but that luckily the house had survived thanks to changing wind patterns.
Kimmel noted that the King Of Staten Island actor knows a fair amount about helicopters compared to the online critics, as he owns his own helicopter.
Burr sH๏τ down claims that planes should have been used more in the first night to fight the fires. He said their were ‘100-knot’ winds preventing safe flight. ‘You wanna do that at night? You f***ing lunatic’
Burr continued to mock the critics by reciting one of their commonly used phrased: ‘This was definitely mismanaged.’
‘Like some f***ing idiot on the internet knows how to manage the worst fire in LA, sitting there in his underwear,’ he joked
But Burr joked that he couldn’t just fly it away from the approaching fire, as he learned that helicopters are expensive, so he only got a two-seater and didn’t want to have a ‘Sophie’s Choice’ situation when it came to choosing if his wife Nia or one of their two children would get to escape with him.
Instead, they all ‘piled into the SUV like everybody else.’
Burr returned to compliment people working to quickly restore service after damage caused by the fires.
‘These guys were out there, clearing the trees and getting the wires back up and everything,’ he said. ‘It was like the perfect awful thing that could have happened, and it did.’
The comedian also called out social media users who have been sharing conspiracy theories about homeless people or vagrants starting the blazes.
‘They light fires every day! They’re living outside,’ he joked about homeless people, using that as evidence that they probably didn’t suddenly start the devastating fires.
He also bashed the ‘theory that some homeless guy without a car went from Altadena all the way to the Pacific Palisades — did he have a hang glider?’
The two parts of LA County are located about 35 miles apart, and would take anywhere from one to two hours to get from one place to the other by car, depending on the time of day.
Burr revealed he knows a fair amount about planes because he owns his own helicopter. But he didn’t use it to escape because he got a ‘two seater’ to save money and he didn’t want a ‘Sophie’s Choice’ when he picked who would come with him
Burr slammed conspiracy theories claiming that a homeless person or arsonists had started the fires, the largest of which are about 35 miles apart, or one to two hours by car depending on time of day; fire devastation pictured from Tuesday in LA
So far, there’s no evidence that the LA fires are the result of arson.
Instead, the power company Edison International is being investigated over claims that a downed conductor could have started one of the fires.
Multiple lawsuits have also been filed against Southern California Edison over claims that the power company sparked the Eaton fire, which has devastated Altadena and Pasadena.
Burr went on to criticize CNN and other news organizations for focusing on rumors and conspiracy theories about arsonists while not covering insurance companies, some of which canceled policies in the affected areas late last year, leaving residents whose homes burned with no safety net.
‘Free Luigi!’ he shouted, referencing Luigi Mangione — who’s accused of murdering UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson — to laughter and applause from the audience.
Elsewhere in the segment, Bill revealed that he was surprisingly calm when his family had to evacuate their home, as he only becomes oddly calm in crises and only gets comically upset over minor inconveniences.
So far, at least 25 people have died as a result of the LA fires, and more than 180,000 people have been forced to evacuate.