This morning we went to the evacuation centers offering our help, dropping off toiletries and such we had laying around. We registered with the red cross as a host home – we can take some pets along with their owners here and thought that would be valuable. We then went to the east shore (Nevada Beach) to retrieve our mighty hound Ras. We knew we were okay.
Well. When we returned and approached our neighborhood around 2:00 pm we were alarmed. Lots of smoke. We began to think more about ourselves. We printed out an evacuation list and followed its instructions: turn on all indoor lights, remove inflammable window coverings, place lawn furniture into the garage, unlock all doors, turn off the gas, etc.
The situation was very different from this morning – way different from being able to offer shelter to others!
I was up on our cedar shake roof hosing it down trying to keep it moist. At one point I realized I could feel the heat from the fire and the red glow on the underside of the nearby smoke billows was exciting. We had already gathered the essentials – passports, records, valuables, stuff like that. I filled some trash cans with water, and continued to hose down the roof with two hoses hooked up to our hose bibs.
Helicopters were flying overhead – the kind that drop water. I could see them so nearby it was amazing – just down the street at tree-top level. The fire was reported to have jumped the highway (highway 89) that had been separating us from the fire. Smoke was billowing really nearby as we prepared to leave.
I called my sister Sally and asked for advice on things to grab, not being particularly lucid as I raced around – Mel is the cooler head around here! The phone rang and we answered it a bit gruffly as we raced to get stuff into the truck.
As we prepared to leave we heard about more and more mandatory evacuations from nearby neighborhoods. But the conditions really began to look better. We hooked up our trailer (need a place to stay after all!) and waited to see what would happen.
We and the neighbors kept looking around and gauging the situation. We learned that the traffic leaving our area was bumper to bumper, just a parking lot, and leaving home to sit in traffic 400 yards away just did not seem necessary. Some people left, but we are hanging around still as of this post. We have learned that we can leave but that it is difficult or impossible to return. The conditions are much better than earlier this afternoon. We intend to stay as long as we think it is safe and/or until we receive a mandatory evacuation order.
What happened today is that the wind came up and the fire just jumped up like crazy. I am hearing on the tv news now that two fire fighters became trapped and had to resort to deploying their fire tent in a meadow as far from timber as they could get and hunker down. They are fine.
Unfortunately the weather report is not good – strong winds for the next four days.
We saw our friend Doug today – he lost his home utterly. He is staying with our friends Kurt and Maryellen. The agencies are here in a big way, and things are getting handled okay, but lots of loss and grief here.
As I read over this I want to assure you that we are not doing anything stupid – we can get out of here in a heartbeat and will do so if it comes to that.
Posting tired with a churning stomach…
-Steve