Multiple wildfires, including the Palisades Fire and Eaton Fire, are raging across southern California Thursday, leaving at least 5 dead and burning more than 27,000 acres, officials say. Police have arrested 20 suspected looters.

Two massive wildfires menacing Los Angeles from the east and west were still burning uncontained on Thursday, but a brief respite from the fierce winds that have fanned the flames for two days allowed crews to slow their explosive spread.

The evacuation to a downtown hotel was done “out of an abundance of caution,” as the Sunset Fire north of the city crept closer to its campus on Sunset Boulevard, Emerson president Jay Bernhardt wrote in the letter sent Thursday to the college community.