Smoke & Ash Damage After 2025 Los Angeles Wildfires: How Remediation Works
Wildfires create obvious damage to structures. But they also create significant hidden damage – like ash, smoke, and soot damage that lingers for years.
Insurance covers smoke damage. Your insurance company should cover the cost of restoring your property to pre-loss condition – including removing any damage caused by smoke, soot, or ash.
The 2025 Los Angeles fires destroyed 12,000+ homes. Thousands more were affected by smoke damage.
Fortunately, there are proven ways to mitigate smoke damage in your home.
Smoke Damage Can Be Deadly
Smoke damage isn’t just a minor annoyance after a wildfire. It comes with serious health risks.
As a fire burns, it creates particulate matter, or PM. This PM rises into the air as particles of different sizes. Some of these particles are small enough to enter the lungs.
These particles aren’t just burnt wood. As the University of Colorado Boulder’s Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES) explains, PM can include asbestos, lead, chemical residues, and volatile organic compounds (VOCs) – many of which are harmful to human health.
Why Smoke & Ash Damage Lingers
Smoke residue can be hazardous, but it can also create a lingering smell.
Here’s how post-fire smell works – and how to remove smell from your home:
Post-fire smell comes from volatile organic compounds, or VOCs. These VOCs often bind to particle filters, making them extra difficult to remove.
As the smoke deposits VOCs onto walls and other surfaces, they can continue off-gassing – often for weeks or months. This leaves a lingering smoke and soot smell around your home.
Post-fire smell will naturally get better. As VOCs get released, fewer VOCs remain in your walls and other surfaces, reducing the smell of smoke over time.
Some VOCs, however, are toxic. As the fire burns, it can create VOCs like dioxins, benzene, formaldehyde, and PAHs, all of which can be harmful to human health.
Other Hidden Damage After a Fire
The 2025 Los Angeles fires caused visible damage to homes and businesses across the Los Angeles area. A significant amount of that damage, however, remains hidden.
Other hidden damage homeowners and business owners should monitor after a fire include:
- Ember damage. Even if your home or business was not visibly impacted by a fire and the structure appears intact, you could have ember damage. Sparks and embers from a nearby fire may have landed around your property, creating damage.
- HVAC system damage. Smoke and soot spread throughout a property via the HVAC system. Even if a fire only impacted one part of your home – like the kitchen – the damage could spread to other parts of your home via the HVAC system.
- Lingering smoke, soot, and ash damage. Even if your structure is intact after a fire, you could have smoke, soot, and ash damage throughout the property. Smoke remediation could cost thousands, and insurance should cover the cost of smoke damage removal.
How to Check Interior Smoke Damage After the 2025 Los Angeles Fires
The Los Angeles County Department of Public Health is warning homeowners to assess damage carefully when returning to their homes – even if there isn’t visible damage to their property.
Fine particles – including asbestos, arsenic, heavy metals, and synthetic materials – could pose health risks. These health risks are particularly prevalent in children and the elderly.
Although this damage is hidden, there will be obvious signs of whether or not your home is safe.
Here’s how Dr. Barbara Ferrer, director of the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health, explains it:
If you don’t see visible soot or ash on surfaces and you don’t smell smoke indoors, your home is likely safe for re-entry.
Some of the ways to check for interior smoke damage include:
- Do a simple wipe test on window sills and walls. Check a wet cloth for residue.
- Walk around your home and smell for smoke. Even if you don’t see ash or soot, you could have smoke damage that requires professional remediation.
- Monitor health symptoms. Coughing, throat irritation, headaches, and breathing problems could all be signs your home needs professional remediation.
Should You Make an Insurance Claim?
Insurance covers the cost of restoring your property to pre-loss condition after a disaster. That includes remediating smoke, soot, and ash damage.
You could try to remediate smoke, soot, and ash damage yourself. However, this can be ineffective without the right equipment. It could also be dangerous.
In cases with moderate to severe damage, it’s better to hire professionals. You pay your deductible, and insurance covers the remaining cost of remediating smoke, soot, and ash damage.
A standard insurance policy covers:
- Smoke damage
- Damage caused by flames and fires
- Ash and soot damage
- Other damage caused by a fire
Check your policy for any exclusions linked to fire damage – especially if you live in a fire-prone region like California.
How Professional Restoration Crews Remove Smoke Damage
Professional cleaners and restoration crews have a proven record of removing smoke damage from properties.
These cleaners often have specialized training by the IICRC certifying them in smoke and fire remediation.
They’ll use industrial vacuum cleaners and carpet cleaners to cleanse smoke damage from deep within the fibers of carpet, for example.
They’ll also take any necessary steps to clear away hazards and toxins – including compounds harmful to human health.
Restoration companies also have high-end deodorization equipment to fully eliminate the smoke smell from your home.
Contact your insurer to safely remove smoke, soot, and ash damage from your property – whether dealing with the 2025 Los Angeles fires or any other fire event.
