Steve Kerr, the head coach of the Golden State Warriors, said that his childhood house was one of the homes lost in the wind-driven flames that have ravaged Southern California this week.
Kerr, who grew up in Pacific Palisades, told reporters prior to Thursday’s game against the Pistons in Detroit that the destruction caused by the Palisades Fire, which started on Tuesday, was “surreal and devastating.”
“That’s my hometown and all my friends who are from they, pretty much they have lost all their homes, family homes, childhood homes…the town looks like it’s completely wiped out,” he stated in a video that Anthony Slater of The Athletic uploaded on X (previously Twitter).
Steve Kerr affirms that the Pacific Palisades fire destroyed his childhood home. He claimed that he and his mother, who survived, had dinner there two weeks prior. He goes into great detail about the destruction caused by the fire and the memories that were lost.mvJuBwPo9g pic.twitter.com/
Since the fires began on Tuesday, Kerr said he has communicated with his siblings and his mother, who is 90 years old. His childhood home, which his parents purchased in 1969, was burned, but they are safe from the Palisades Fire. Kerr graduated in 1983 from Palisades Charter High School, which had also sustained significant damage during the fire.
“It’s hard to even fathom how Pacific Palisades rebuilds and how it becomes a thriving community again,” he continued.
Reminiscent of his childhood in the region, Kerr described Pacific Palisades as a “idyllic place.”
“I’ve made the trek from Pacific Palisades down Sunset Blvd. to the UCLA campus several times because my dad was a professor there. “It was shocking and apocalyptic to see the pictures of Sunset Boulevard and the Palisades after so many wonderful memories,” he remarked.
According to Kerr, he last went home for dinner the night before a game almost two weeks ago. On December 27, the Warriors played the Clippers in Los Angeles.
According to Cal Fire officials, the fire has destroyed at least 10,000 houses and scorched over 20,400 acres as of Friday, though the actual number is likely far higher. Even though it is just 6% contained, the fire has already been listed as one of the 20 most devastating fires in the history of the state.
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