HAMILTON, Canada

US billionaire Rick Caruso emerged as a vocal critic of preparedness in Los Angeles as wildfires continue to ravage the city.

Caruso, known for his real estate empire, highlighted a severe lack of resources during an interview Wednesday with Fox11 Los Angeles.

"There's no water in the Palisades. There's no water coming out of the fire hydrants. This is an absolute mismanagement by the city. Not the firefighters' fault, but the city's," he said.

The billionaire, who ran unsuccessfully against Karen Bass for mayor in 2022, criticized Bass for being abroad on a pre-planned trip to Africa while the city battles one of its worst fire seasons.

"We have got a mayor that is out of the country, and we have got a city that is burning, and there is no resources to put out fires," he said. "It looks like we're in a third-world country here.”

Caruso challenged city and county officials on their long-term preparedness, asking, "Why didn't you work to mitigate this? What was your brush mitigation program?"

Claiming that the fires are not due to a lack of rain but decades of unchecked vegetation buildup, he said residents are the ones "paying the price are all of these."

Fierce wildfires fueled by severe windstorms and bone-dry conditions spread rapidly across parts of north and northwest Los Angeles on Wednesday after claiming five lives and setting more than 1,000 homes, businesses and other structures ablaze.

The Palisades Fire remains the largest after being the first to erupt Tuesday at around 10.30 a.m. local time (1830GMT), burning nearly 16,000 acres as it rapidly spreads in and around the affluent Pacific Palisades neighborhood near the coast.

AccuWeather, a weather forecasting company, estimates that the fires have caused between $52 and $57 billion in damages.

Over 70,000 residents have been forced to flee their homes and at least five people have been killed, according to media reports that cited the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Office.

About 1.5 million people across southern California are without power, according to the PowerOutage.us website. Some of the outages may have been caused by intentional shut-offs, a tactic power companies sometimes employ to prevent live power lines from falling and further spreading wildfires.