In many cases, it took a specific moment—witnessing a neighbor’s house burning down or receiving a call from a family member with orders to evacuate—for a resident to think and react rationally to the crisis at hand. How quickly a person arrived at this phase depended on genetics, experience, and training. Town Manager Gill got stuck in denial for nearly half an hour, debating the merits of the evacuation orders. Norman, on the other hand, had trained—and repeatedly practiced in real life—how to move through the three phases quickly. First responders like him understood the psychology of disaster response, overriding their own fear instincts to help others out of theirs.
Now the captain steered back to Oak Way to see if anyone else needed help. The Walgreens, he realized, was situated on an unburned island in the center of town; the flaming front had wrapped around the area in a U shape. But as the embers got bigger and gained energy, Norman knew, the space between the two arms of the fire would close. He had already told the firefighters to scope out other buildings where people could take shelter. As he drove down Oak Way, flames arced toward his vehicle, sucking up oxygen. He reversed and inched forward in a desperate game of Frogger, trying to prevent his vehicle from melting in the radiating heat. The engine in his SUV would fail without oxygen. He didn’t have much time. Norman tried to make out the landscape over his dented hood. Don’t get trapped, he told himself. Don’t be stupid.
He drove over a few more front yards, smashing through a white picket fence. It was the wild kind of stuff he had dreamed about in his fire-obsessed youth—only this was not a dream and his survival wasn’t guaranteed. He looked up and saw a couple in the street. The man was kneeling on the ground near a bush. Near him, the woman was pacing. A parked car filled with their possessions sat in the driveway, and a second car waited on the street. Three houses away, the fire was devouring a shed, raging in their direction. What the hell are they doing? Norman crawled out of his SUV and ran toward them. “You have to go,” he shouted, his voice disappearing in the cacophony of flying tree branches. “Get out of here right now.”
“We can’t leave,” the man said. “We lost the keys to our car.”
“You don’t have time,” Norman yelled again. “No more waiting, you gotta go.” He’d take them himself if he had to.
“Do you have an electric saw?” the man asked.
“No, I do not carry a Sawzall in my vehicle. If you’re not going to leave, I’m going to,” Norman replied, glancing back to make sure his escape route was still viable. He was fighting not flames but psychology. The couple didn’t understand the peril they were in. “You have two minutes to leave,” Norman said, knowing there was nothing he could do, really, to force these people to abandon their vehicle.
The man ran into a nearby garage and reappeared with a saw. He worked deftly, cutting off the components around his steering wheel and hot-wiring the car. Norman watched him, impressed. Even he didn’t know how to do that. “Okay, we are going,” the woman said. They took off, one vehicle tailgating the other.
Norman carried on down Oak Way, kicking in the front doors of houses. He didn’t want anyone to be left behind. But the residents on this block appeared to have gotten out. The flames had begun to surge again, the wind carrying dead songbirds, shingles, tree bark, and other debris on its breath. Norman returned to his SUV. He reversed, driving back the way he had come. He hadn’t gone a mile when he ran into the same couple.
They rolled down the window: “We ran out of gas! Can you help?”
OBSERVATION: THE SHERIFF’S DAUGHTER
Butte County sheriff Kory Honea, forty-seven, had reversed traffic on the Skyway and was helping direct vehicles downhill when he looked up and saw his daughter. She was standing in the intersection, moving motorists forward. Twenty-four years old, Kassidy was following in the law enforcement footsteps of her parents. Her mother was a dispatcher; her father was the county’s top law enforcement officer. She had joined the Paradise Police Department as an officer six months earlier and was the only woman on the force. She could hold her own. Sheriff Honea was so proud of her. They had the same clear blue eyes and wide smile, even the same initials. Sometimes one would borrow the other’s gold name badge.
A Winnebago trailer passed, then a gray SUV, a red pickup. Kassidy windmilled her arms, beckoning them forward. She was in navy blue; her father was in tan and green. They both wore N95 masks over their mouths. There was comfort in recognition and fear in understanding, particularly in moments like this.
The sheriff took his mask off for a moment. A call had crackled over his radio. Some of his deputies were trapped, and he needed to check on them. “I’m gonna go, my guys need me,” he told his daughter. He wanted to say so much more, unsure whether he would ever see her again. “I love you, kiddo.”
“I love you, Daddo,” she said back.
THE FIRE: SIEGE IN SIMI VALLEY
More than 460 miles to the south, a new wildfire sparked. Near Simi Valley, on the boundary between Los Angeles and Ventura counties, the Woolsey Fire began so quietly that the hazy ash might have been, at first, mistaken for air pollution. California was now beset by flames along the north and along the south, each region overflowing with its own miseries and diverting resources from the other.
The massive pressure gradient that spread across the state’s backbone tried to equalize, sagging over Southern California and building above the mountains. It fed the winds, which fanned the Woolsey Fire through the chaparral-covered Santa Monica range at the same time that they fed the Camp Fire through the pine-stubbled Sierra Nevada. The Woolsey Fire torched small ranches, movie sets, and the Malibu mansions of celebrities, models, and millionaires. It steamrolled through trailer parks, uprooting power poles and trees on the way. A phalanx of private firefighters arrived to protect the wealthiest homes as it tore a path to the Pacific Ocean, the blue-green waters reflecting the destruction. Fire engines were staged on beaches normally scattered with bright beach towels and foam surfboards. Confused seagulls careened through the sky, dive-bombing into the sand. Along the Pacific Coast Highway, hot winds gusted over the cars, the people as vulnerable as celluloid dolls.
CHAPTER 11
“THE SAFETY OF OUR COMMUNITIES”
The line of vehicles barreled down Edgewood Lane and past Travis’s house, clouding the air with dust. Fire roared through the nearby gully, and a pack of drivers had turned off Pearson Road, near the mobile home park on the corner, to avoid it. Paul and Suzie, still across from Travis on their four-wheeler, watched with worry as the vehicles passed. Travis checked for alerts on his phone. The traffic was an unusual intrusion: No one traveled on Edgewood unless they lived there.
The remoteness was part of the lane’s appeal. It made the area feel far from the hustle and bustle of civilization, though the convenience of grocery stores and shops was actually only a few miles away. Neighbors on Edgewood recognized one another. In the early evenings, one woman strolled with her pets—not just her three dogs but also the goat, the horses, the vicious goose, and even the family bird, which perched on her shoulder. Another neighbor was known for his baked tofu. They watched out for one another, alerting the rest of the road if they saw a black bear pawing at an unlocked garbage bin.
Time had passed so quickly, Travis realized. Only a few minutes earlier, the neighbor across the street had pulled her clean underwear from the clothesline and evacuated safely. Her jeans and blouses shook on the line, forgotten. By the time Paul and Suzie had done a reconnaissance mission down the street on their quad, the mouth of Edgewood was choked by flames. The couple had already parked their cars—a blue Toyota 4Runner and a gold Toyota Corolla—in Travis’s driveway, as they always did during a wildfire. His home was safer, after all; the man was religious about keeping invasive weeds at bay and maintaining the ring of defensible space around his and his wife, Carole’s, bungalow. In the back of Suzie’s sedan, her parakeet, Lucky Penny, flitted about
its cage.
With Edgewood blocked, Travis knew the best option would be to escape on their four-wheelers. He left his packed Subaru in the driveway and headed for the garage, pulling on the emergency cord so he could heave the door open without the help of electricity. Then he backed out his beloved vintage truck, in which his Polaris quad was stowed under a golf cart cover in the bed. Some models of the four-wheeler sold for upwards of $15,000. Carole often joked that it was Travis’s “show pony” because he spent so much time washing and polishing the sides and buffing the leather. He kept a towel draped over the seat so that it wouldn’t get dirty. On this morning, he held the towel over his mouth as a buffer against the smoke.
Farther down Edgewood, Beverly Powers, sixty-four, and her partner, Robert Duvall, seventy-six, idled in their vehicles. They had loaded their two trucks and travel trailer with camping equipment, just in case. But the couple had taken too long to pack and found themselves trapped at the intersection of Edgewood Lane and Marston Way, about 200 feet south of Travis’s home. At a house near theirs, sixty-three-year-old Ernest Foss sought comfort in his dog, Bernice, as his caretaker—his thirty-six-year-old stepson, Andrew Burt—pushed the bedridden musician in a wheelchair out the front door, dragging the older man’s oxygen tank behind them. On the street, Joy Porter, seventy-two, braked, part of the caravan of cars. She and her son Dennis Clark, forty-nine, were horrified to realize that they had chosen a dead-end route.
Travis pulled down the ramps on the truck bed and unloaded the four-wheeler. It was nicer than Paul’s; to jump-start the engine on his, Paul had to throw the quad into neutral and complete the circuit by jamming its innards with a screwdriver. Travis had watched him jury-rig the engine hundreds of times. For seven years, the men had ridden the craggy trails around Paradise together. Their favorite course was to the south, on the 1,500-acre property held by a prominent local family. Travis and Paul had received special permission to explore the property’s farthest corners; in return, they often picked up discarded beer bottles or cleared downed branches. The afternoon rides were relaxing, the men lost in the forest with the sun on their backs. Travis loved the crisp autumn air and the musky scent of pine after the season’s first rain. He knew every ditch and gully in the land surrounding his eight acres.
Now he and Paul brainstormed in the driveway about where to head to safety. There was a grassy field not too far away that might offer refuge. Paul also knew of a slot canyon with a waterfall that gushed through its center. Out of the corner of his eye, Travis saw his next-door neighbors, Jeanette and Mike Ranney, emerge from the smoke. Mike wore Nomex pants and leather boots, his long brown hair in a ponytail down his back. He was a contract wildland firefighter, a regimented and detail-oriented sixty-two-year-old who knew how to take care of himself. He was carting his collection of silver coins and uncut opals, as well as one of their outdoor cats in a large duct-taped Tupperware bin. Jeanette, fifty-three, carried their other kitten in a cage meant to trap skunks.
Travis stalled his quad. “What are you guys doing?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” Mike said. “I’m going to make a run through the fields, try to reach Libby Road to the west. Maybe we can outrun the fire.” If not, he explained, he and Jeanette would shelter in the unnamed stream behind Travis’s house. It wasn’t much of a waterway—steep and narrow, bordered by brush—but Mike thought it might offer the best shot at survival. Travis and Carole had once wanted to dam a small pond off the stream, but the mating calls of red-legged frogs were so deafening at night that they had changed their minds about encouraging them.
“Do your best,” Travis said. There were no police cars, no sirens—just the roar of the approaching wildfire. The sky flashed orange as Edgewood Mobile Home Estates exploded about 800 feet away. Flames soared 120 feet high, a wall of fire about three-quarters the height of the Arc de Triomphe. Travis knew they had to leave. The cats yowled in their carriers. He shouted goodbye, not sure he would see Mike and Jeanette again, then navigated his four-wheeler over the narrow bridge that crossed the creek below his house. Paul followed with Suzie, her arms cinched around his middle, chin tucked against his shoulder. Embers the size of dinner plates somersaulted through the air, their edges glimmering orange. Gray pines, one of the most flammable tree species, ignited in staccato bursts.
A few yards down the trail, Travis heard the wildfire’s approach from the west. It rumbled, chewing through the pine needles and slamming dry leaves against the tree trunks, as loud as a jet plane. How did it get there? he thought. Suzie clung harder to her husband. They gunned the four-wheelers, weaving through the forest at 10 to 12 mph. Manzanita scraped at their ankles. Travis, realizing that the flames were blitzing in the direction of both the grassy field and the cavern, tried desperately to think of another place to shelter. Suddenly it came to him. About two miles south, there was a sloping, lava-cap-covered bluff overlooking the Sacramento Valley. Seeded with grass, it had little vegetation or timber that might burn.
“Follow me,” Travis mouthed over the din, motioning Paul and Suzie forward.
His voice was hoarse from the smoke. Ash stung his eyes as he whipped past trees that seemed to be bending with the wind, a testament to the fire’s strength. The trio navigated another half mile, then parked their quads side by side on the bluff. Travis pointed downhill, at a reddish rock outcrop that might shield them. Paul had packed a coat and a blanket, and he tucked the extra clothing around Suzie, trying to protect as much of her skin as possible. He also reached for the small Igloo cooler strapped to the back of his quad. It was stocked with the last tomatoes from his and Suzie’s garden, a checkered napkin, a canteen of water, and some strawberries. The couple had figured they would need to eat lunch eventually. Paul grabbed it by the handle and the three of them hurried downhill, trying not to catch the toes of their shoes on the craggy terrain. Feet crunching on the dehydrated grass, they skirted around rocks the size of bowling balls. Travis stumbled over a dip and slammed to the ground, hitting his head and bruising his left leg. Without stopping to catch his breath, he scrambled to his feet again, pressing forward in the darkness.
His cellphone kept ringing. He had no idea how he still had cell service. He answered each call, explaining first to his father, then to his son, and then to his daughter-in-law that he might not make it. He also spoke to Carole, who was stuck on the Skyway with all the other evacuating drivers. She was tracking her husband’s movements from a GPS app on her own phone and had called 911 on his behalf. Travis, Paul, and Suzie hadn’t been on the bluff longer than ten minutes when they heard the whine of trees as they boiled: The flaming front was bearing down on them.
“We were trying to outrun the flames to the north, but they’ve surrounded us now. I don’t know what to do,” Travis told Carole. Sitting in her car, she realized the tires on her sparkly blue Subaru Impreza were flattening in the heat. “Hopefully I get out of this,” Travis said. “I love you.”
Finally the three reached the boulder, the fire close behind. From a distance, the outcropping had appeared bigger than it actually was. About the size of an armchair, the boulder was the perfect size for two people—not three. They crowded together behind the rock, hunching to protect their heads. The wall of flames blasted forward. The wait was terrifying.
“This is gonna be a bad one,” Paul said.
* * *
—
MORE THAN 150 MILES to the southwest, conversation was buzzing at PG&E’s newly minted Wildfire Safety Operations Center. It had opened earlier that year at corporate headquarters, a thirty-four-story skyscraper located on Beale Street in San Francisco’s Financial District. The center, housed in a room on a top floor, was staffed 24/7 by meteorologists, engineers, and other safety experts, who studied fire risk across the company’s service area. They needed to decide whether or not to black out portions of eight counties as a matter of public safety.
The center had
opened in May 2018 to much fanfare. The media were rarely allowed access to PG&E’s impenetrable fortress, which the company had occupied for more than a century, but for this occasion, journalists had been granted a widely publicized tour. Patrick Hogan, the utility’s senior vice president of electric operations, had been quick to pin the impetus for the new center on climate change. “Extreme weather is increasing the number of wildfires and length of [the] season in California,” he said, failing to mention PG&E’s vulnerable grid. “We must continue to adapt to meet the challenges created by this ‘new normal.’ ”
Just before lunchtime, the analysts noted that the day’s devastating winds were losing some of their intensity. Perhaps the shutoffs might be avoided—though PG&E was hardly in the clear yet. Meredith Allen, forty-eight, was the senior director of regulator relations, responsible for making sure the company met the guidelines set by the state and federal government. A Benedictine College graduate, she had a law degree from the University of California, Berkeley. Allen worked hard and had already been up for hours. She had emailed four department heads from the California Public Utilities Commission with an update at 4:16 a.m. “We are continuing to closely monitor weather conditions,” she’d explained, adding that the potential shutoff was “expected to occur between 0600 and 1000 hours, or possibly later.”
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