Los Angeles, Jan.15 (BNA):  Firefighters on Tuesday held the line against two massive wildfires that have ravaged parts of Los Angeles for the past week, even as desert winds and a parched landscape presented extremely hazardous conditions.

Some 8,500 firefighters from at least seven states and two foreign countries prevented the blazes from growing for the second day. Still, according to Reuters, the fires have consumed an area the size of Washington, D.C.

A fleet of aircraft dropped water and retardant into the rugged hills while ground crews with hand tools and hoses have worked around the clock since the fires broke out on January 7, with the aircraft occasionally grounded by high winds.

The death toll from the fires rose by one on Tuesday to 25, according to the Los Angeles medical examiner's office.  The estimate of structures damaged or destroyed held steady at over 12,000, still portending a Herculean rebuilding effort ahead.

Entire neighborhoods have been leveled, leaving smoldering ash and rubble. In many homes, only a chimney is left standing.

In hard-hit Pacific Palisades, Karina Maher and her husband Michael Kovac experienced some "survivor guilt" that their home made it through the fire while many of their neighbors' properties were lost.

A team of 50 firefighters and sheriff's deputies conducted house-by-house searches, looking for any lingering fires and hazards such as lithium-ion batteries connected to solar panels.

The Palisades Fire also approached the priceless art collection at the J. Paul Getty Museum, which houses paintings by Van Gogh, Rembrandt, Monet, and Degas.

Private forecaster AccuWeather estimates total damage and economic loss between $250 billion and $275 billion, which would make it the costliest natural disaster in U.S. history, surpassing Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

M.f.m.a, H.K, Z.H, A.A