The Fires of Los Angeles and the Mutable Cross

A client emailed me recently and asked my take on the astrological energies that were occurring with the recent Los Angeles fires.

I am familiar with Pacific Palisades and Malibu having lived on Point Dume in Malibu in the early 1970s.  A most beautiful area bounded by the Pacific Ocean on the west and the Santa Monica Mountains on the east, the Palisades and Malibu are liable to wildfires during the dry season and mudslides during the rainy season.

One time when I was living in Malibu and returning home from dinner in L.A., the rains were so intense they were triggering mudslides flowing down onto PCH [Pacific Coast Highway].  With bulldozers scooping up mud from the roadway, the California Highway Patrol stopped cars from proceeding, then allowed only residents to go forward led by a California Highway Patrol car in single file, caravan-style.

I remember one Valentine’s eve a boulder over twenty feet in diameter rolled off a hill above PCH in Malibu, rolled across PCH and crushed the fence to a vacant beachfront lot.  Fortunately, the giant roll occurred at 2:00 AM with no cars in its path across PCH.

Wildfires are a natural phenomena often ignited by lightning, other times by a human who either negligently or intentionally causes the flareup. 

The natural cycles in southern California have winter’s rainy season followed by a dry period. The rains encourage vegetation growth which becomes brittle during the dry season and provides kindle for a lightning strike to trigger a raging fire fanned by high winds.  The vegetation is burned leaving the landscape barren.  The rains come and with no vegetation to secure the ground, the land gives way to mudslides.  The pattern repeats.

Before we moved to Florida thirteen years ago, we lived in Monterey County, California, with an apartment up on the Peninsula close to the school where my wife worked in Pebble Beach and a ‘ranch’ property in the southern part of the county, very rural [my wife would suggest desolate] with the nearest grocery store being a forty-five-minute drive.  It was high desert country mentioned in the 1933 John Steinbeck novel To a God Unknown, and our property was suggested to have been the far eastern end of William Randolph Hearst’s vast land holdings on the central coast. 

One summer, fires erupted in the Los Padres National Forest to the west of us.  We could see the flames on the ridges and checked the post office daily for the updates to the fires and any progress made towards dousing them.

Apart from the wildfires, we experienced earthquakes, one of which was a magnitude 6.5 quake that killed two people and damaged over 50 buildings in Paso Robles.  My wife had been in Paso earlier that day but was on the highway coming home. She didn’t feel the quake, but she told me later that if she had felt the quake, we would have been in the car, leaving California, and returning to Connecticut.  At the time of the quake, I was inside our home at our ‘ranch’ property about forty miles northwest of Paso.  I felt the house shake, went outside, and surfed the land waves from the quake’s aftershocks.

BUT I digress…

Every individual, every country, every city, every entity has an astrology chart based upon the time of their ‘birth’, which for a country can be the time of its founding, for an administration the time of inauguration, for a business the time of opening, etc…

In researching the question of the L.A. fires posed to me, I found it eerily fascinating what the astrological energy configurations indicated.

Los Angeles was founded on September 4th, 1781. 

With astrology appreciating and acknowledging the laws of cycles and relativity, we recognize that the natal chart is impacted by transits, where the planets are now vis-à-vis the natal chart.

What stands out in the recent transits to the L.A. chart was the Mutable Sign Grand Cross with transiting Jupiter and Saturn in difficult connections to the L.A. chart’s Sun and Saturn.

Transiting Jupiter in the Air Sign of Gemini enhancing air and wind squared the natal Sun and opposed the natal Saturn, the intensity of the winds could raise questions regarding the management and competency [natal Virgo Sun] and the effectiveness of the physical infrastructure and the organizational structure [natal Saturn].

All of us who have lived in California and especially southern California are familiar with the Santa Ana winds and their potentially destructive influence.  Semis have been blown over, fruit orchards destroyed, and houses damaged.

In his 1938 novel, Red Wind, Raymond Chandler wrote: “There was a desert wind blowing that night. It was one of those hot dry Santa Anas that come down through the mountain passes and curl your hair and make your nerves jump and your skin itch. On nights like that every booze party ends in a fight. Meek little wives feel the edge of the carving knife and study their husbands' necks. Anything can happen.”

While transiting Jupiter was triggering a Mutable Sign T-Square to L.A.’s chart, transiting Saturn in Pisces [water] was in orb of a square to natal Saturn indicating delays or restrictions to the water flow.  Many of the fire hydrants ran dry with little water to fight the fires.  And a 117-million-gallon water reservoir, the Santa Ynez Reservoir, near the Palisades was empty under renovation.

With Saturn also related to structure and management and transiting Saturn opposed L.A.’s natal Sun [executive, leader], the question of competence in the management of the city came into question regarding the mayor herself, the chief executive and chief engineer of the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, and the Los Angeles Fire Chief.  Even the governor came under blame for lack of brush clearance.

A client recently asked my view of the astrological energies surrounding the Los Angeles fires of January 2025. The question stirred old memories and familiar landscapes — the luminous coastlines of Pacific Palisades and Malibu, where I once lived on Point Dume in the early 1970s. That stretch of California is among the most beautiful in the world, bounded by the Pacific Ocean on one side and the Santa Monica Mountains on the other — a meeting place of wind, sea, and flame. Yet its beauty has always lived in tension with its peril, for the Palisades and Malibu are equally prone to wildfires in the dry season and mudslides when the rains return.

I remember one evening driving home to Malibu after dinner in Los Angeles as torrential rains began to loosen the earth. Mudslides were pouring onto Pacific Coast Highway — bulldozers working through the night to clear the roadway as the California Highway Patrol led residents in single-file caravans back toward their homes. And one Valentine’s Eve, around two in the morning, a massive boulder — more than twenty feet in diameter — rolled from a hillside above PCH, crossed the highway, and smashed through the fence of a vacant beachfront lot. By grace alone, there were no cars in its path.

Wildfires, like mudslides, are part of nature’s own rhythm — sometimes sparked by lightning, other times by human negligence or will. Southern California’s pattern is one of elemental conversation: winter rains encourage lush vegetation, which dries and hardens through the arid months, becoming tinder for wind-driven flame. The fire clears the land; the rains return; the barren slopes, now unanchored, collapse in mudslides. And then the cycle begins anew — creation, destruction, renewal — the immutable law of nature made visible.

Before moving to Florida thirteen years ago, we lived in Monterey County, California, keeping both an apartment on the Peninsula near the school where my wife worked in Pebble Beach and a ranch property far south in the county — high desert country that she would describe, with affectionate irony, as desolate. The nearest grocery store was a forty-five-minute drive. It was the same landscape John Steinbeck wrote of in To a God Unknown (1933), and our property was said to mark the far eastern edge of William Randolph Hearst’s once-vast coastal holdings.

One summer, fires erupted in the Los Padres National Forest to our west. From our porch, we could see flames cresting the ridgelines — a reminder that distance offers no immunity. Each day we checked the post office for updates on containment and evacuation, scanning the notices that marked progress or retreat.

California, of course, gives lessons in many forms. Beyond the fires, we felt the earth move — one quake in particular, a 6.5 magnitude centered near Paso Robles, killing two and damaging more than fifty buildings. My wife had been in Paso earlier that day, but by the time the quake hit she was already driving home. “If I’d felt that,” she later told me, “we’d have been in the car — heading east and not looking back.” I was at the ranch, forty miles northwest, and felt the land ripple beneath me — walked outside and literally surfed the waves of earth rolling through the aftershocks.

But I digress…

Every person, every city, every country carries an astrology chart — a celestial fingerprint of the moment of its birth. For nations, it may be the date of founding; for administrations, the hour of inauguration; for businesses, the opening of their doors. And for Los Angeles — the City of Angels — that natal moment was September 4th, 1781.

In astrology, we recognize the eternal interplay between the natal chart and the transits — the current planetary positions that activate, challenge, or illuminate the original blueprint. When I studied the transits during the January 2025 fires, what emerged was striking: a Mutable Sign Grand Cross, a configuration of tension, friction, and release.

Transiting Jupiter and Saturn were forming difficult aspects to Los Angeles’s natal Sun and Saturn. Jupiter, moving through the Air Sign of Gemini, amplified both air and wind — an apt symbol for the strong Santa Ana gusts — while squaring the city’s natal Virgo Sun and opposing its natal Saturn. The symbolism was exact: the Virgo Sun speaks to management, service, and structural efficiency; Saturn represents form, responsibility, and control. Jupiter’s windy exuberance inflamed the system — the literal winds fanning flames, and the figurative winds questioning competence and organization.

Anyone who has lived in Southern California knows the Santa Anas — those hot, dry currents that sweep through the mountain passes and ignite both tempers and tinder. In his 1938 novel Red Wind, Raymond Chandler described them with cinematic precision: “There was a desert wind blowing that night. It was one of those hot dry Santa Anas that come down through the mountain passes and curl your hair and make your nerves jump and your skin itch. On nights like that every booze party ends in a fight. Meek little wives feel the edge of the carving knife and study their husbands' necks. Anything can happen.”

While Jupiter intensified the fire through air and motion, Saturn — transiting in Pisces, the water sign — was simultaneously in a close square to Los Angeles’s natal Saturn, signaling restriction, delay, and deficiency. Water, the element that should quench the blaze, was itself constrained. Reports confirmed that many hydrants ran dry and that the 117-million-gallon Santa Ynez Reservoir near the Palisades — a crucial source of water — was empty, under renovation at the very time it was most needed.

With Saturn also opposing the natal Sun — the symbol of leadership and executive direction — questions arose around management competence. The mayor, the chief engineer of the Department of Water and Power, the fire chief, and even the governor faced public scrutiny. Saturn in hard aspect exposes the cracks in authority; under its pressure, weak foundations falter.

And yet, as in all mutable energy, adaptation and improvisation emerged alongside chaos. Private individuals took initiative where institutions faltered. One such example was billionaire developer Rick Caruso, who had run against Karen Bass in the previous mayoral election. Caruso hired a private firefighting team to defend his Pacific Palisades properties — a move that successfully protected every one of his buildings. It was a modern reflection of Saturn’s principle in action: self-discipline, structure, and preparedness amid disorder.

The symbolism was unmistakable. Fire and air intensified beyond control, while water and earth — the elements of containment — were lacking. The Mutable Grand Cross revealed the city’s fragile balance between elements, management, and fate.

As the philosopher George Santayana wrote in 1905, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” Nature’s patterns are cyclical, and so are human lessons. The fires will eventually be extinguished. The rains will come, bringing renewal — and with them, the danger of mudslides on the bare hillsides. Vegetation will return, grow lush, dry out again, and await the spark of another season. The wheel turns. The pattern repeats.

Astrology teaches us that energy is never random — it moves in cycles of tension and release, destruction and rebirth. The fires of Los Angeles in 2025 were not only a natural phenomenon but also a mirror of collective energy — an invitation to see how the elements within and around us interact, collide, and evolve. In every conflagration there is both loss and illumination, both the burning and the becoming.