The La Tuna Fire was first reported on a Friday afternoon, at the start of a holiday weekend, under conditions that made it difficult to fight: temperatures up to 106°F, relative humidity as low as 16 percent, and the kind of dry, gusting winds that turn embers into artillery. By 4:00 p.m. the fire had established itself on both sides of Interstate 210, and the California Highway Patrol closed the freeway between Lowell Avenue and Sunland Boulevard. By 9:30 p.m., 1,500 acres had burned.

Mandatory evacuation orders went out for neighborhoods in Glendale, Burbank, and the Sunland-Tujunga community. Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti declared a local emergency on Saturday night. California Governor Jerry Brown declared a state of emergency for Los Angeles County. By that point, 1,061 firefighters were on the fire with 206 engines, 9 helicopters, 5 water tenders, and 4 dozers. One hundred firefighters who had been deployed to assist with Hurricane Harvey relief in Houston were recalled to Los Angeles.

The fire burned for nine days. Smoke became trapped beneath an atmospheric inversion — a layer of warm air above cooler air near the surface — and settled over Burbank and the eastern San Fernando Valley in a gray-brown haze. The South Coast Air Quality Management District issued advisories telling affected residents to stay indoors. At times, air quality meters registered dangerous levels.

The containment lines advanced when conditions allowed: when wind speeds dropped, when humidity climbed slightly at night, when air tankers could operate without being buffeted off course. Ground crews worked in the canyon terrain — steep, brushy, with limited access — while helicopters made water drops from above. The fire was fully contained on September 9. On October 26, 2017, the Los Angeles Fire Department closed its investigation into the fire's origins without determining a cause. The report stated that the fire was "not suspicious in nature" and showed no evidence of arson. The cause has never been determined.

The Verdugo Mountains are a small, isolated range rising above Burbank and Glendale — the hills visible from the 5 and 210 freeways that form the distinctive skyline of the northeastern Los Angeles Basin. They are not wilderness in any pristine sense; they are surrounded on all sides by dense urban development. But they are genuine open land, and the fire burned through them with the thoroughness that chaparral fires achieve.

In the aftermath, the blackened hillsides turned green within a single rain season. Chaparral is built for this: many of the shrubs that form it, including chamise and toyon, sprout from root crowns that survive fire underground. The La Tuna Fire destroyed five homes and five outbuildings and caused at least ten injuries. The loss was real and specific for those families. For the mountain ecosystem, fire is not an aberration but a recurring event — one that clears the old growth and makes room for what comes next. The fire also inspired the formation of the volunteer-based La Tuna Canyon Fire & Rescue department, established to improve local emergency preparedness.