Report from the Front Lines
First-person account of dangerous dilemma: Should I go or should I stay?
11 p.m. Thursday:
About 10 engine trucks lined up at the corner of our street and Old San Marcos Road earlier tonight for “structure protection” for our neighborhood. Not good. It’s 11 p.m. now and they are gone, either up to Painted Cave or perhaps to Patterson Avenue above the curve, both of which are under mandatory evacuations. All day long we’ve been under siege as water-dropping helicopters fly low over our neighborhood. The power went out again, and we had to pack up in darkness, me with the camping headlamp, Daniel with candles and lanterns. We were told to leave when the trucks arrived earlier, but along with some other neighbors we opted to stay. As of now we are ready to go, stuffing as much as we can into two cars with room for the three big dogs. Daniel was supposed to go to work tonight, but I said ”No, you don’t.” He agrees in retrospect and they found someone to cover for him.
How do you decide what to take, and what to leave? For me it’s writing, music, photo albums and great-grandma’s red lamp. Some of the Indian jewelry that survived the 1990 Painted Cave Fire for sentimental reasons. Maybe they’re good luck things? There are things I learned in the last fire that you just can’t replace. Hard drives, external hard drives, laptops, yeah, we got all that. But the mementos. They hurt the worst. And the hell with the rest. And, no, at this point, we can’t take loads out and come back — because they won’t let us back in. We do have a place to go to, which is good, even with the dogs. So until we get the word, we are here, packed and ready, drained, sweaty and high on adrenaline. I’m having wine. Go figure! So are the neighbors. It’s a gallows humor-sort group at this point. We’ve been through this before. And the rest have fled. I can hear those helicopters even now, which is amazing, I didn’t think they flew at night. The wind has picked again, too, and it’s blowing right toward us. We are triangulated between the two mandatory evacuation areas. Dead in the direction the wind is blowing.
Uh ... the big fire trucks are back. Not a good sign. Our neighbor is a newscaster and right now she is doing a live phone-in broadcast about how the winds have just picked up significantly again. Reports of structures lost are now coming in. I’ve opened the north window in my office — and the winds are strong again — the smell of smoke choking and way too close. On the second story I have a bird’s eye view of fire trucks going by. And also not good: the winds are predicted to be a factor through 4 a.m.
Not sure fireworks are going to be fun for us this year …
Laura Hout is a Santa Barbara real estate agent.
» wrote on 07/09/08 @ 09:36 AM
Good, solid reporting, Laura. I always wonder what I would
grab after the photo albums. Hope to see you soon-so stay safe. harriet
» wrote on 07/06/08 @ 07:03 AM
We learned a lot during this experience. I hope to share some of that soon. Our officials do the best they can. But it’s up to US to be as informed as we can.
Laura Hout
» wrote on 07/05/08 @ 02:50 AM
Laura, I definitely understand your dilemma! We evacuated from West Camino Cielo when the fire started to get real close to Windermere on thursday evening. What keeps us in the house as long as possible is the fact that the agencies have proven over and over again that they keep us out of the houses for too long. Once you go, it’s a for a long time until the last CYA guy at the agency shuts up. They don’t seem to have the notion of degrading an evac order to a warning, which would be a way to say “we don’t think it’s really safe yet, but if you really want to we’ll let you back in”.
At the moment the evac order for Painted Cave looks pretty ridiculous. All our friends living there are shaking their heads and have stayed. Really sad to see how the agencies have lost the trust of residents by acting this way.
» wrote on 07/04/08 @ 04:36 AM
Thank you for taking the time to write this report even in the midst of waiting to be evacuated. I am sure this must be very painful for you; hopefully your home will survive even if you are evacuated.
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