Science
There's a reason you can't stop doomscrolling through L.A.'s fire disaster
Even for those lucky enough to get out in time, or to live outside the evacuation zones, there has been no escape from the fires in the Los Angeles area this week.
There is hardly a vantage point in the city from which flames or plumes of smoke are not visible, nowhere the scent of burning memories can’t reach.
And on our screens — on seemingly every channel and social media feed and text thread and WhatsApp group — an endless carousel of images documents a level of fear, loss and grief that felt unimaginable here as recently as Tuesday morning.
Even in places of physical safety, many in Los Angeles are finding it difficult to look away from the worst of the destruction online.
“To me it’s more comfortable to doomscroll than to sit and wait,” said Clara Sterling, who evacuated from her home Wednesday. “I would rather know exactly where the fire is going and where it’s headed than not know anything at all.”
A writer and comedian, Sterling is — by her own admission — extremely online. But the nature of this week’s fires make it particularly hard to disengage from news coverage and social media, experts said.
For one, there’s a material difference between scrolling through images of a far-off crisis and staying informed about an active disaster unfolding in your neighborhood, said Casey Fiesler, an associate professor specializing in tech ethics at the University of Colorado Boulder.
“It’s weird to even think of it as ‘doomscrolling,’ ” she said. “When you’re in it, you’re also looking for important information that can be really hard to get.”
When you share an identity with the victims of a traumatic event, you’re more likely both to seek out media coverage of the experience and to feel more distressed by the media you see, said Roxane Cohen Silver, distinguished professor of psychological science at UC Irvine.
For Los Angeles residents, this week’s fires are affecting the people we identify with most intimately: family, friends and community members. They have consumed places and landmarks that feature prominently in fond memories and regular routines.
The ubiquitous images have also fueled painful memories for those who have lived through similar disasters — a group whose numbers have increased as wildfires have grown more frequent in California, Silver said.
This she knows personally: She evacuated from the Laguna Beach fires in 1993, and began a long-term study of that fire’s survivors days after returning to her home.
“Throughout California, throughout the West, throughout communities that have had wildfire experience, we are particularly primed and sensitized to that news,” she said. “And the more we immerse ourselves in that news, the more likely we are to experience distress.”
Absorption in these images of fire and ash can cause trauma of its own, said Jyoti Mishra, an associate professor of psychiatry at UC San Diego who studied the long-term psychological health of survivors of the 2018 Camp fire.
The team identified lingering symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder, depression and anxiety both among survivors who personally experienced fire-related trauma such as injury or property loss, and — to a smaller but still significant degree — among those who indirectly experienced the trauma as witnesses.
“If you’re witnessing [trauma] in the media, happening on the streets that you’ve lived on and walked on, and you can really put yourself in that place, then it can definitely be impactful,” said Mishra, who’s also co-director of the UC Climate Change and Mental Health Council. “Psychology and neuroscience research has shown that images and videos that generate a sense of personal meaning can have deep emotional impacts.”
The emotional pull of the videos and images on social media make it hard to look away, even as many find the information there much harder to trust.
Like many others, Sterling spent a lot of time online during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic. Back then, Sterling said, the social media environment felt decidedly different.
“This time around I think I feel less informed about what’s going on because there’s been such a big push toward not fact-checking and getting rid of verified accounts,” she said.
The rise of AI-generated images and photos has added another troubling kink, as Sterling highlighted in a video posted to TikTok early Thursday.
“The Hollywood sign was not on fire last night. Any video or photos that you saw of the Hollywood sign on fire were fake. They were AI generated,” she said, posting from a hotel in San Diego after evacuating.
Hunter Ditch, a producer and voice actor in Lake Balboa, raised similar concerns about the lack of accurate information. Some social media content she’s encountered seemed “very polarizing” or political, and some exaggerated the scope of the disaster or featured complete fabrications, such as that flaming Hollywood sign.
The spread of false information has added another layer of stress, she said. This week, she started turning to other types of app — like the disaster mapping app, Watch Duty — to track the spreading fires and changing evacuation zones.
But that made her wonder: “If I have to check a whole other app for accurate information, then what am I even doing on social media at all?”
Our universe might be chock-full of cosmic wonder, but you can observe only a fraction of astronomical phenomena with the naked eye. Meteor showers, natural fireworks that streak brightly across the night sky, are one of them.
The latest observable meteor shower will be the Lyrids, which has been active since April 14 and is forecast to continue through April 30. The shower reaches its peak April 21 to 22, or Tuesday night into Wednesday morning.
According to NASA, the Lyrids are one of the oldest known meteor showers, and have been enjoyed by stargazers for nearly 3,000 years. Their bright, speedy streaks are caused by the dusty debris from a comet named Thatcher. They appear to spring from the constellation Lyra, which right now can be seen in the eastern sky at night in the Northern Hemisphere.
The moon will be about 27 percent full tonight, appearing as a thick crescent in the sky, according to the American Meteor Society.
To get a hint at when to best watch for the Lyrids, you can use this tool, which relies on data from the Global Meteor Network. It shows fireball activity levels in real time.
And while you gaze at the heavens, keep an eye out for other stray meteors streaking across the night sky. Skywatchers are reporting that the amount of fireballs is double what is usually seen by this point in the year.
Where meteor showers come from
There is a chance you might see a meteor on any given night, but you are most likely to catch one during a shower. Meteor showers are caused by Earth passing through the rubble trailing a comet or asteroid as it swings around the sun. This debris, which can be as small as a grain of sand, leaves behind a glowing stream of light as it burns up in Earth’s atmosphere.
Meteor showers occur around the same time every year and can last for days or weeks. But there is only a small window when each shower is at its peak, which happens when Earth reaches the densest part of the cosmic debris. The peak is the best time to look for a shower. From our point of view on Earth, the meteors will appear to come from the same point in the sky.
The Perseid meteor shower, for example, peaks in mid-August from the constellation Perseus. The Geminids, which occur every December, radiate from the constellation Gemini.
How to watch a meteor shower
Michelle Nichols, the director of public observing at the Adler Planetarium in Chicago, recommends forgoing the use of telescopes or binoculars while watching a meteor shower.
“You just need your eyes and, ideally, a dark sky,” she said.
That’s because meteors can shoot across large swaths of the sky, so observing equipment can limit your field of view.
Some showers are strong enough to produce up to 100 streaks an hour, according to the American Meteor Society, though you probably won’t see that many.
“Almost everybody is under a light-polluted sky,” Ms. Nichols said. “You may think you’re under a dark sky, but in reality, even in a small town, you can have bright lights nearby.”
Planetariums, local astronomy clubs or even maps like this one can help you figure out where to go to escape excessive light. The best conditions for catching a meteor shower are a clear sky with no moon or cloud cover, sometime between midnight and sunrise. (Moonlight affects visibility in the same way as light pollution, washing out fainter sources of light in the sky.) Make sure to give your eyes at least 30 minutes to adjust to seeing in the dark.
Ms. Nichols also recommends wearing layers, even during the summer. “You’re going to be sitting there for quite a while, watching,” she said. “It’s going to get chilly, even in August.”
Bring a cup of cocoa or tea for even more warmth. Then lie back, scan the sky and enjoy the show.
Where weather is least likely to affect your view
Storm systems sweep across the country in early spring, and some will be obscuring skies tonight. But there will still be plenty of areas with clear skies, particularly in parts of the central United States.
“The best spot is going to be in the Upper Midwest,” said Rich Bann, a meteorologist with the Weather Prediction Center.
Minnesota, Wisconsin and Iowa will offer especially good sky-viewing weather and a beach on the Great Lakes could be a nice spot to look up at the stars.
But don’t expect to view the show from Chicago, as Illinois could see some thunderstorms. The weather will be better in the Northern and Central Plains, particularly the eastern Dakotas.
High, wispy clouds are expected over the Ohio and Tennessee Valleys and into parts of the Mid-Atlantic. But, Mr. Bann said, “you may be able to see some shooting stars through thin clouds.”
Clouds will be draped across much of the Southeast and the Northeast, though there could be some clearing in Florida, Georgia, the Carolinas and Virginia. Remember, the meteors could be visible all night long. If you look outside and see clouds, try again later.
Catching the spectacle will be challenging across much of the West, particularly from Washington into Northern California, where a storm system is bringing rain and snow. That system will move east overnight.
There are likely to be some pockets of clear skies at times across southern Nevada, northwest Arizona and southwest Utah, Mr. Bann said.
Amy Graff contributed reporting.
WASHINGTON — Amid growing national security concerns, the FBI said Tuesday that it has launched a broad investigation in the deaths or disappearances of at least 10 scientists and staff connected to highly sensitive research, including four from the Los Angeles area.
“The FBI is spearheading the effort to look for connections into the missing and deceased scientists. We are working with the Department of Energy, Department of War, and with our state and state and local law enforcement partners to find answers,” the agency said in a statement.
The FBI’s announcement comes after the House Oversight Committee announced that it would investigate reports of the disappearance and deaths of the scientists, sending letters seeking information from the agencies involved in the federal inquiry as well as NASA, which owns the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in La Cañada Flintridge, where three of the missing or dead scientists worked.
“If the reports are accurate, these deaths and disappearances may represent a grave threat to U.S. national security and to U.S. personnel with access to scientific secrets,” Reps. James Comer (R-Ky.), chairman of the committee, and Eric Burlison (R-Mo.) wrote in the letters.
President Trump told reporters last week that he had been briefed on the missing and dead scientists, which he described as “pretty serious stuff.” He said at the time that he expected answers on whether the deaths were connected “in the next week and a half.”
Michael David Hicks, who studied comets and asteroids at JPL, was the first of the scientists who disappeared or died. He died on July 30, 2023, at the age of 59. No cause of death was disclosed.
A year later, JPL physicist Frank Maiwald died at 61, with no cause of death disclosed.
Two other Los Angeles scientists are part of the string of deaths and disappearances.
On June 22, 2025, Monica Jacinto Reza, a materials scientist at JPL, disappeared while on a hike near Mt. Waterman in the San Gabriel Mountains.
On Feb. 16, Caltech astrophysicist Carl Grillmair was fatally shot on the porch of his Llano home. The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s department arrested Freddy Snyder, 29, in connection with the shooting. Snyder had been arrested in December on suspicion of trespassing on Grillmair’s property.
Snyder has been charged with murder.
There is no evidence at this point that the deaths and disappearances, which occurred over a span of four years, are connected.
A spokesperson for NASA, which owns JPL, said in a statement on X that the agency is “coordinating and cooperating with the relevant agencies in relation to the missing scientists.
“At this time, nothing related to NASA indicates a national security threat,” agency spokesperson Bethany Stevens wrote. “The agency is committed to transparency and will provide more information as able.”
Representatives from Caltech, which manages JPL, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The sun had barely risen over the Pacific Ocean when a small motorboat carrying a team of Indigenous artisans and Mexican biologists dropped anchor in a rocky cove near Bahías de Huatulco.
Mauro Habacuc Avendaño Luis, one of the craftsmen, was the first to wade to shore. With an agility belying his age, he struck out over the boulders exposed by low tide. Crouching on a slippery ledge pounded by surf, he reached inside a crevice between two rocks. There, lodged among the urchins, was a snail with a knobby gray shell the size of a walnut. The sight might not dazzle tourists who travel here to see humpback whales, but for Mr. Avendaño, 85, these drab little mollusks represent a way of life.
Marine snails in the genus Plicopurpura are sacred to the Mixtec people of Pinotepa de Don Luis, a small town in southwestern Oaxaca. Men like Mr. Avendaño have been sustainably “milking” them for radiant purple dye for at least 1,500 years. The color suffuses Mixtec textiles and spiritual beliefs. Called tixinda, it symbolizes fertility and death, as well as mythic ties between lunar cycles, women and the sea.
The future of these traditions — and the fate of the snails — are uncertain. The mollusks are subject to intense poaching pressure despite federal protections intended to protect them. Fishermen break them (and the other mollusks they eat) open and sell the meat to local restaurants. Tourists who comb the beaches pluck snails off the rocks and toss them aside.
A severe earthquake in 2020 thrust formerly submerged parts of their habitat above sea level, fatally tossing other mollusks in the snail’s food web to the air, and making once inaccessible places more available to poachers.
Decades ago, dense clusters of snails the size of doorknobs were easy to find, according to Mr. Avendaño. “Full of snails,” he said, sweeping a calloused, violet-stained hand across the coves. Now, most of the snails he finds are small, just over an inch, and yield only a few milliliters of dye.
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