Simon Cowell has made an emotional plea for support following devastating wildfires that continue to rage across Los Angeles, where the media mogul has owned property for a quarter century.
Taking to Instagram over the weekend, the 65-year-old Britain’s Got Talent judge expressed his distress over the ongoing crisis.
“Los Angeles has been my second home for the past 25 years. I am devastated by what I’ve seen and read. What is happening right now is horrific,” Cowell said in his video message.
The entertainment executive announced he would be making a donation to the Red Cross and urged others to follow suit, adding: “I strongly ask other people like myself, who can do something to help, to help.”
The wildfires have already claimed 24 lives as of Monday morning while destroying over 37,000 acres of land and 12,000 structures across Los Angeles County.
An estimated 153,000 residents are currently under mandatory evacuation orders, with approximately 57,000 structures remaining at risk.
At least 13 people are still reported missing as the inferno continues to spread. Several major routes, including off-ramps to the 405 Freeway at Getty Center Drive, Skirball Center Drive, and other key boulevards, have been closed to limit traffic in West Los Angeles.
According to Cal Fire, at least six fires are currently burning, with the Palisades fire being the largest, as of Sunday evening.
LA authorities have declared a local health emergency for the entire county, citing “severely degraded air quality” that poses immediate and long-term public health risks.
Cowell’s connection to Los Angeles spans 25 years, with the media mogul owning property in Malibu, one of the areas severely affected by the current wildfires. The entertainment executive has split his time between the UK and US throughout his career, launching several successful television franchises including American Idol in 2002 and America’s Got Talent in 2006.
His Malibu residence is located in one of the regions where thousands have been forced to evacuate, alongside other celebrities including LeBron James, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Kamala Harris.
“I’m sending you my love, my prayers, my support,” Cowell concluded in his Instagram message, having witnessed the devastation in an area he has called his second home since the late 1990s.
Growing anger has emerged against celebrities accused of squandering vital water resources that could have been used to combat the fires.
Strict water-conserving measures have been in place since 2022, limiting ordinary residents to watering their gardens twice weekly for eight minutes.
Kim Kardashian, who lives in the $60 million Oaks gated community near one of the fire epicentres, was previously fined for using 232,000 gallons of water above her allocation.
“These celebrities have a sense of entitlement. Everyone was told to cut back on water precisely for this situation, to preserve it to fight fires. They carried on watering because they could afford the fines,” a neighbour told the Mail on Sunday.
Further controversy surrounds wealthy residents hiring private firefighters at $2,000 per hour. Chris Dunn, owner of Covered 6, reported: “My phone has been ringing off the hook. Demand has never been higher.”
When it launched in 1986, the Porsche 959 instantly became the fastest production road car in the world. Yet a top speed of 197 mph was not the most fascinating thing about it. Not only was the 959 fast, but it was ultra-capable in almost any conditions, thanks to development work that had originally grown out of Porsche’s attempts to build a world-beating rally car. Only 292 examples were made, and they do not come up for sale often.
That makes this 1987 Porsche 959, up for sale on Bring a Trailer (which, like Car and Driver, is part of Hearst Autos) a rare opportunity. It is not a delivery-mileage paperweight, ready for museum duty and not much else, but a properly sorted example intended to provide one of the most exceptional driving experiences money can buy.
A quick snapshot of 959 history follows. In 1981, with the 911 poised to be replaced by the more conventional, front-engine 928, Porsche’s new managing director Peter Schutz issued a change in plans. The 911 must continue forward, but could its somewhat archaic rear-engine layout be competitive in the future? Since the knife-edged Group B rally series was still around, Schutz gave the green light to Porsche’s engineers to build a car that could compete.
Group B didn’t last—it was simply too dangerous—but the 959 did go rallying. Perhaps its most memorable victory was a first, second, and sixth-place finish at the 1986 running of the grueling Paris–Dakar Rally.
The road-going version of the 959 is no less impressive. Power comes from a flat-six engine displacing 2.85 liters, with sequential twin-turbocharging, a technology first seen here and now only used by Bugatti. The engine was an evolution of Porsche’s air-cooled tradition, with the heads water-cooled to better handle high-boost temperatures. Total power was 444 horsepower.
The only transmission available was a six-speed manual with a very short first gear. Engineers developed an advanced all-wheel-drive system that was capable of dynamically shifting torque front to rear depending on road conditions, able to send as much as 80 percent to the rear wheels under hard acceleration.
