They had only a short time between knowledge that they had to evacuate and the fire overrunning the town. The stories are very sad, including people who went to get friends who could not evacuate on their own, but then the group of cars got caught in the fire as they were trying to drive out of town.
There is a need for faster warnings, and perhaps cutting trees back from the sides of major roads to reduce deaths due to cars on the roads being set on fire.
Knowing CA, attempts to cut back trees were probably hampered by environmentalists. In 2011, CT/MA had a major snowstorm with heavy wet snow and leaves still on the trees in late Oct., knocking out power for almost 100% CT North of I-84 all the way to the MassPike. IIRC 60-70% of CT lost power for days.
Next spring when it was tree cutting season, numerous areas complied the utilities wanted to trim trees back from power lines.