Wildfires continue to ravage the greater Los Angeles area this afternoon, with five major fires that have claimed at least five lives and thousands of structures. This includes many, many homes belonging to everyone from celebrities like Billy Crystal and John Goodman in Pacific Palisades to working class suburbanites, with no end in sight to the whipping winds and spreading flames. This is going to end up as the costliest fire in California history.

For more, KCBS political reporter Doug Sovern spoke with Mark Whaling, a former Los Angeles Fire Captain and battalion chief who spent 42 years fighting fires, including in the Morgan Hill and Monterey fire departments and now owns and runs Whaling Fire Line, which makes equipment for fighting wildland fires.