Camp Fire Contained; Paradise In History Books Even After Drill

CHICO, CA -- California’s deadliest and most destructive wildfire in history may be fully contained, but it has broken all boundaries with its impact on those who fight them and fear them.

“All we have is a line around the fire. It doesn’t mean everything’s out in the center,” Cal Fire Deputy Chief Scott McLean told Patch at the Incident Command Center in Chico Sunday.

It was as if the longtime firefighting official doubted the hard 100 percent containment because it was so long and hard to accomplish. After two weeks and three days, Butte County’s raging, hot inferno incinerated 14,500 structures, killed 85 people, displaced hundreds, sent animals scurrying and spanned over 153,336 acres from its Camp Creek and Pulga roads’ origin to the far reaches of Highways 99 and 70.

The day of the fire that ignited at 6:29 a.m., McLean jumped in his vehicle and on the inferno from his Sacramento office. He instinctively knew it was big. After his initial assessment, he told Patch the town of Paradise “was gone.”

And to think, Paradise was a model town in terms of emergency preparedness and responsibility.

“They didn’t take this lightly. They had their firebreaks. They had their evacuation drill. With all that, this fire was not a characteristic fire,” he said. “It was nighttime at 9 o’clock in the morning.”

The wind-whipped, Manzanita- and madrone-fueled fire swirled southwest from Pulga through Concow and hit Paradise up to Magalia through the Feather River Gorge with a vengeance seldom seen in most wildland blazes. At one point, the fire began threatening the outskirts of Chico. The firefighters staged a no-holds-barred frontline against that attack. Embers traveled from as far away as two miles.

Residents barely got time to get out if they did at all.

“You couldn’t necessarily be prepared for that,” he said with a sigh.

McLean plopped down on the utility trailer sofa, exhausted but not defeated – despite the cold he picked up in the stress along the way. Debriefing and decompressing would need to come after U.S. Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke makes a visit. He’s due to swoop in Monday to check the progress for himself.

This fire took its toll.

Just ask the 6,000 firefighters from multiple states, countless volunteers and scores of Butte County Sheriff’s, California Highway Patrol and Paradise Police personnel who endured long hours and rough conditions. They’re now down to about 1,000 to watch the hot spots.

The unprecedented blaze brought firefighting veterans out of retirement.

“I saw it come over Sawmill Peak,” retired Cal Fire Capt. Lloyd Romine told Patch on a tour through the fire area. The 27-year firefighter from Magalia knew it was big, referring to its catastrophic nature of a fire driven by wind, plenty of fuel to burn, warm temperatures and bone dry conditions. Northern California had gone a month and a half without precipitation.

“Things were different with this fire. All my guys (in Magalia) say this is the worst fire they’ve ever seen,” he said.

Romine quickly volunteered for the North Valley Animal Disaster agency, finding and rescuing many domestic dogs and cats. One white cat even found him, nudging on his leg one day.

Residents longing to find their pets have begged him to go on the prowl. Along the way, the forever firefighter transported an aquarium filled with tropical fish when the homeowner was forced to evacuate.

“That was a first,” Romine said, while tossing a shard of glass that he could tell exploded with the fire’s heat. The fire roared up Billie Road, one in a handful of thoroughfares that took the brunt of the damage.

“Kitty, kitty,” he called out for the lost pet on Tyden Way off Billie Road. He placed the cage in a tipped-over garbage bin and put out cat “party mix.” The property was barely comprehensible, and the ground still smoldered from the destruction. Cars were burned out as if the lots were a wrecking yard, metal was mangled and thick ash blanketed the ground.

This was a common, eerie scene throughout the burn area. Street after street was lined with mangled metal, leaning walls, twisted, downed power lines, burned out homes with tossed-about stoves and tanks and only the hearth of fireplaces left standing.

It was less common to have a building still erect. Les Schwab, Wells Fargo, O’Reilly’s Auto Parts, Walgreens and Auto Zone were able to withstand the inferno. But where one building stood, the one next to it failed.

“This was only open for a year,” Romine said, overlooking the remains of Mamma Celeste’s pizzeria off Skyway. The place was flattened with the exception of the outdoor patio table with umbrellas.

It soon became apparent the crews tasked with the macabre job of sifting through the remains to find bones would have a difficult assignment – especially after the rain.

Dressed in a full hazmat jumpsuit, Josh Knutsen of the Monterey County Sheriff’s Department called the full containment announced Sunday as “a little victory.” For now, the rain over the last few days made it “harder to dig into” the ground at the site. Teams were working diligently off Pentz Road, where twin mobile home parks stood.

All were happy they could breathe again, as the smoke from previous days made the air unbearable. Some in the crews picked up a raspy cough.

“I didn’t know how we could do this,” said Placer County Sheriff’s Sgt. Sage Bourassa, who was assigned to 125 team members out digging in the remains at Pentz and Wagstaff roads. Unlike much of the town’s uncanny quiet, the corner was bustling with SAR crews working along with the gigantic PG&E operation that brought out cranes and other heavy equipment.

In the midst of the activity, Butte County Sheriff’s Chaplain Tom Adams was on hand for counseling and pulled over in his vehicle. He was raised in Paradise, which he assessed lost 98 percent of its homes.

“You know, they’re just trying to make DNA matches. There are no bodies for them to find. There are only bones. The fire was so hot,” said Adams, a former hospice chaplain who's been assigned for counseling to law enforcement, utility workers and firefighters.

A job well done doesn't come easy.

"This has been a rough but important deployment for the team members. Everyone's pretty beat up," Menlo Park Fire Chief Harold Schapelhouman said, adding that contributing to the difficult assignment was the time period with "long days working in a completely devastated burned out community that's located in our back yard."

Schapelhouman's crew joined several fellow firefighters that made up the San Mateo County Strike Team and a special Federal Emergency Management Agency Task Force.

"Everyone knows somebody who lost a home or more. The team was honored to be there, but it's hard to feel completely finished with so many people still missing," the chief said.

Closure is an issue.

"I know many feel like they're leaving a little piece of themselves behind because it's hard not be emotionally impacted by what they saw and were involved with," said Schapelhouman, who lost a family homestead in Magalia.

The fire is under investigation.

See also

• Camp Fire Volunteer Will Never Be The Same
  
• Camp Fire Claims Second Sunnyvale Native Home
  

--Images via Sue Wood, Patch