Those of us not immersed in the Hollywood epic may be asking why a natural disaster that has resulted in a relatively small number of casualties is grabbing all the attention.

The answer may be in this brilliant picture, posted on BBC and reminding us that this is a disaster that has razed 10,000 properties (mostly of this opulence) to the ground.

Our conception of personal success is increasingly a pyramid where those based in west Los Angeles are regarded as based in the pyramid’s pinnacle. A regard that’s based on wealth.

Those on the other side of town are able to look to the horizon and see letters spelling out Hollywood and dream of a life under the sign. But now the sign itself is under threat and this is making the headlines.

This morning we are told that the fatalities are now ten or more but that this may not have been a natural disaster as an arsonist has been arrested –  a suspected arsonist that is. I dare not look further than the BBC that is interrupting Radio 3 to give us updates and appears to have taken over BBC 2 to offer rolling livestream.

For what we are seeing happening here is an attack on our pyramid of value and wrath is following those in possession of power without their capacity to do anything. They may try to use their swimming pools to quench the firestorms but they are left impotent as their wealth is taken from them.

For many, the wealth will be returned  with the help of the insurance industry which will spread the cost of rebuild and restitution of other possessions over all policyholders. So the restoration of the peak of the pyramid will be via an indirect tax on those lower down.

Undoubtedly we will see a more heated attempt to spread blame. This cannot be a blameless catastrophy. Already we are hearing of those from the wrong side of town looting what is left of the good side. Many of these people have no insurance either because they have nothing to protect or because they are deemed criminal. But they will be blamed for what has happened.

I cannot think of an example of this kind. I am writing from a street in the City that was cleaned out by fire and plague, these catastrophies of the 17th century still live with the City. Coronavirus, the bombings of the last decade of the millennium revived our latent view that we were rightfully holders of the wealth and should be protected and not inflicted by such catastrophies. Not the City please.

So I see the attitude of those impacted by the current disaster in this context. They cannot believe that this could happen to them, those with the wealth and those looking on cannot believe that they are vulnerable as any other people are, to this random disaster.

Over time there may be positives arising. Perhaps people will understand that wealth does not protect you and that the problems being faced by the West Hollywoodian are problems faced by many round the world. That the death toll is fantastically small and the sympathy for their loss suggests that they are privileged and could use that privilege to protect more than themselves.

The figures out this morning about climate change cannot be impacted by those suffering this disaster directly. But they could – in the context of what is happening in California, prick the general conscience to improve our behavior to ensure that such disasters do not become a normal state of affairs.