In a bizarre press conference streamed online, LA County Fire Battalion Chief Christian Litz delivered a sharp lesson on basic water pressure physics to Tesla CEO Elon Musk, while also refuting his controversial claims about the ongoing California wildfires.
During the awkward livestream, Litz explained the realities of water system limitations to a fisheye-lensed Musk. “If we have one building burning, we could flow 1000 gallons a minute… you can imagine 1,000 gallons per house, we couldn’t do [it],” Litz said. “There really is no water system that’s going to keep that pace.”
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Litz went on to explain that in order to maintain water pressure, the amount of water flowing into the system must equal the amount being used. With the increased demand for water due to the fires, the LA County Fire Department has been relying on tanker trucks to supplement the system. “We were flowing an amount of water that the system couldn’t hold,” Litz said, highlighting the overwhelming demand on resources.
Musk, who had been criticized for making misleading statements about the fires, was directly challenged by Litz’s explanation. Many public figures took to social media to call out Musk, including California Governor Gavin Newsom, who remarked that Musk had been “exposed by firefighters for his own lies.”
Ed Krassenstein, a social media personality who has often supported Musk, also weighed in, writing, “This isn’t about a water shortage. It’s about the pipes being overwhelmed. People need to stop spreading misinformation.”
The video, which was widely shared, became a focal point for correcting Musk’s false claims, particularly his suggestion that diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives were responsible for a “water shortage” exacerbating the wildfires. Musk had previously implied that “powerful minorities” and DEI hires were to blame for the crisis, a statement that was swiftly debunked by fire officials.
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Rather than stepping into the field of disaster response, Musk seemed to have inserted himself into the crisis from the comfort of a Los Angeles conference room, where he was given an elementary breakdown of the situation by County Fire officials. It remains unclear why Musk chose to present himself in this way, or whether his intervention was needed at all.
In true Musk fashion, he also took the opportunity to promote his own projects. “We are going to position Cybertrucks with Starlinks and free Wi-Fi in a grid pattern in the areas that most need it in the greater LA/Malibu area,” Musk announced on social media.
It is still unclear how many Cybertrucks Musk has deployed or what other aid he plans to provide to those affected by the wildfires, or even who requested his help in the first place.
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