Actor James Woods fought back tears Wednesday during an interview with CNN as he talked about the devastation in the Palisades fire that destroyed his home.

“I thought I’d be stronger than this,” Woods, 77, said, as he teared up during the interview. He talked about how his home in the hillside felt like “Mount Everest” and that he was too old to make the trek up to his home these days.

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But the gut-wrenching moment came when he explained how his wife Sarah was chatting with her 8-year-old niece and how she brought out her piggy bank “for us to rebuild our house.”

Hollywood actors like Woods, Mark Hamill, and Mandy Moore were been forced to flee their homes because of the fire, which is now estimated at 15,832 acres. Star Wars actor Hamill said he evacuated “so last minute there [were] small fires on both sides of the road.” In an Instagram post, he added it was the “most horrific” blaze since the Kinneloa Fire of 1993.

Woods has been live-tweeting videos of the fire near his home. This included scenes of flames licking his home’s decking and rampaging through the house of a neighbor. Hours later, he revealed that his home’s smoke detectors were pinging alerts to his phone, in a sign that his property was succumbing to the blaze. “I couldn’t believe our lovely little home in the hills held on this long. It feels like losing a loved one,” he said. “It tests your soul, losing everything at once.”

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