When it rains ashes: How one Californian survived the fires
By: On Spec Podcast
Tags: California, Wildfires

Veronica Steiner

Veronica Steiner is a journalism major at Laney Community College where she is a staff writer and feature editor for The Citizen. She is a new mother to a bouncing baby girl, full time student, community activist, and aspiring foreign correspondent. She is part of On Spec’s Intern Mentorship Program.

The entrance to Jesse’s property and their neighbor’s mansion ablaze. Photo: Cal Fire

We are still waiting for rain in California. We had a different kind of rain a few months ago, ashes flew across the sky and onto our cars and roofs. The sky turned an orange-red one September morning, but it wasn’t a sunset. It was the haze of fires engulfing us. We wished for drops of water to fall, but they have yet to come. Instead, as firefighters kill one fire, another begins. It’s December and we are still fighting fires.

In late September, the government gave a red flag warning that conditions are ideal for wild land fire to spread because of high temperatures and gusting winds. When these warnings are issued, residents within the areas must be on alert, packed and ready to evacuate in case a wildfire breaks out. I was going to a baby shower and I was worried because I would be near the Glass Fire, a small fire that had started the night before. I told myself that fires are nothing new to California residents, so I went. I had to drive about an hour from my home in the East Bay to my friend Jesse’s celebration in Santa Rosa. As I was driving, I could see the sky becoming increasingly hazy.

The baby shower decorated and all of the gifts brought by family and friends. Photo: Jesse’s mom, Sarane.

Despite the risks with the pandemic and wildfires, my friends and I decided we would throw a baby shower for our friend Jesse, who was expecting her second child that month. We knew the risks but really yearned to see each other, so we planned a small gathering outdoors. Jesse’s property in Santa Rosa housed four generations of her family and their array of animals on more than six acres. This year in the summer and early fall, temperatures had reached record high in California. On September 27, the day of the baby shower, it was over 100 degrees Fahrenheit (38 degrees Celsius).

I turned on the air conditioning and thought about life while I drove. I had become a mother in July and at times motherhood was a struggle with limited human interaction. I thought about how Jesse would handle motherhood in the midst of so many crises.

Climate change has always been an important issue to me, but for the next generations to worry about and fix. Yet, the fires that blazed across the west coast this fall showed that climate change is not a problem we can put off any longer. Santa Rosa in particular has been severely hit by fires over the past three years, and the problem will continue because there’s little rain. Many people have decided to leave the area to avoid being victims of fire, but this isn’t only a California problem.

In 2020 alone, several states in the U.S. fought ravaging fires, including Oregon where images of the orange sky went viral on social media. Globally, we watched the Amazon forest burn in Brazil and devastating fires in Australia kill wildlife and displace hundreds of residents. Climate change is taking many different forms across the globe and in my hometown of Santa Rosa, it rears its ugly head in the form of fire. Our community has been decimated by three massive fires in the past four years and when the news buzz passes, the residents are left with the horrible reality of this global issue.

Jesse on the day of her baby shower at their family house on the six-acre property. Photo: Jesse’s mother, Sarane

I arrived at Jesse’s around 1 p.m.. Everyone was gushing over her belly and baby to be, but the gender wasn’t the only surprise we had in store for us that afternoon. Between games and catching up, the Glass Fire picked up steam. At some point in the party, I asked my friend’s father Dale how he felt about the past few weeks’ fires and if he was distressed about what could happen to their home and the county. The last fire to burn the area was the Sonoma-Lake-Napa Unit Lightning fire just two months before, which burned more than 363,000 acres. Dale pointed to his immaculate gardens — maintained yards have a lower risk of catching on fire — but he still worried that their family could be in danger sooner or later.

Inside Jesse’s property, with the barn, the neighbor’s house and property burning in the background. Photo: Cal Fire

The Glass Fire had started at 4 a.m. that morning about 12 miles from Jesse’s house.

By 5 p.m., most of the guests had left. The last of us were sitting on the lawn watching Jesse open her gifts when it began to heavily rain ash. Something like that should be jaw dropping, but it had become so normalized, we hardly noticed it.

At 7 p.m. I decided to return home, giving hugs and kisses to my longtime friends and second family. As I was leaving, I thought about how in a time of such uncertainty, a new baby is a blessing that could make COVID19, unemployment, and the fires bearable. On my way home, I decided to make one more stop to our other family friends, the Avallones, a few blocks away from where I grew up.

I was raised on Raters Drive, three doors down from our family friends. This year has been particularly unforgiving to the Avallones — the wife was diagnosed with dementia and her husband is her caregiver. I stopped and bought flowers on the way. I stayed and traded memories with them for about an hour. When they insisted I stay, I promised them I would visit again soon with my husband and our new baby. Little did I know my decision to leave then was the universe providing me with a safe passage home.

On the drive back, my car was covered in ash. I could still see the road and make my way home through the empty highways. I was thinking about how fortunate I was to have my family, a healthy baby girl, and a safe place to lay my head.

When I arrived in the East Bay an hour later, I turned on the news as I did my homework. What I saw shook me to my core. Santa Rosa was being evacuated because of the Glass Fire. The small flames had turned into a raging inferno. I immediately called Jesse and checked on them as well as the elderly couple. They were all in grave danger. If I hadn’t left the moment I did, I would also have been stuck on a one lane road scrambling to get out.

Within three hours, the Glass Fire had burned my old neighborhood in Santa Rosa. My friend Jesse and everyone in her family desperately searched for a place to lay their heads that night. Meanwhile, the Avallones, the elderly couple, slept in their car listening to the news, hoping their house was still standing.

The town that had hosted our moments of joy and celebration mere hours ago was now a battleground for survival. Jesse and her family eventually found a hotel to stay in and would remain there for the next three days. She was anxious and stressed from the evacuation of not only her family, but all of their livestock that followed them in trailers. They left on a moment’s notice with little to nothing, It was the next morning when I called to check in that I got more bad news. Jesse’s neighbor’s house had burned to the ground.

That night and the next day, firefighters spent hours saving what they could of Jesse’s six-acre property. It was that afternoon when they got the news that their family house had made it, but Jesse’s grandma’s cottage and the pool house had been destroyed. They left the hotel and rented an Airbnb for two weeks where Jesse’s newborn son was taken from the hospital after his birth. Jesse was heartbroken whenever her 2-year-old son cried wanting to go home every night. Jesse and her family eventually returned home, but they’re busy rebuilding and cleaning.

The Avallones, the elderly couple, survived the Glass Fire without much harm. Firefighters saved all but two homes on Raters Drive. Everyone I went to visit that day made it out alive, and that is what is important. But fires have a long term impact — it takes time to physically rebuild and emotionally recover from losing personal belongings.

Three years ago, fires destroyed different neighborhoods in Santa Rosa and some of those families are still dealing with the fallout. Their homes have not been rebuilt completely because some homeowners are fighting insurance companies to pay for the damage. In California, everyone buying a home is required to get fire insurance, but if their homes are burned, it’s not easy getting the money from these companies to rebuild that home. The finances and home may be replaced, but there’s still a sense of loss and a constant uncertainty.

And much of it comes back to climate change. The undeniable presence of this global issue has caused me to reflect on my own habits, and how I can reduce my footprint. As a household, we don’t buy single use plastic bags, bottles or soap containers anymore. We upcycle all containers and jars for storage and cook vegetarian at home. These are all small steps to help mitigate the impact we have moving forward, but it doesn’t change the damage already imposed by these fires and the climate crisis.

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