(Dawn talked, I wrote. Put into her Gofundme page)
The night of the dry lightning storm was a hot night after a hot day. I went to bed at 11pm (Saturday, August 15) and had no screens on the windows. My bed was 10 inches from the window and there was a light breeze. The winds started and were fierce. The next thing I knew there were redwood needles pelting me as I woke up with no blanket over me due to the heat. The dog was going crazy. The lightning was crackling, followed by rolling thunder that never ended. It rained big rain drops but did not last long. I couldn’t tell if it was rain on the roof or redwood needles. It was so loud. I had just finished doing heavy maintenance on the yard. It looked like it had a manicure with everything I had pruned. In the morning redwood branches were everywhere. I called everyone to see what had happened to them.
One of the lightning strikes had started the Big Creek fire. My tenant drove down to see the fire. This was three miles down the coast. I drove down to watch that fire’s progress three times. This started Sunday night. The ocean was making a huge noise. I started to get nervous.
The Last Chance community always thought that if a fire started at Waddell, they would lose the whole Last Chance community. It started on the north side of the north creek If they could only have kept it there, they would have been fine. But no one attended to it.
There were at least a dozen trucks at Big Creek from CalFire. No fire trucks anywhere else.
I kept trying to keep track of other fires in the area. It was making me nervous. I started to think about what I would have to do should I be mandated to evacuate the area in a hurry.
I had an original 1958 Ford Ranchero in my barn, original everything. I had a John Deer LE210 Landscape Loader. I also had a Wood Mizer portable saw mill. That sawmill cut wood that built at least twelve homes in Last Chance.
Last Summer, Richard Simpson from CalFire met with everyone at Last Chance and told them what needed to be done to survive fire season. The community followed his advice and prepared. We did everything he asked.
Jessica was the Fire Marshall that summer.
Richard Simpson asked us to put in turnouts along the road. We did that. Put in a water tank. We did that. Locate all the water supply. Done, we did that.
He said that Calfire would be driving the road to keep them all informed and would be using the water supply information provided to CalFire.
I moved the tractor to the top of the hill in a turnout. That way, they could use the road and the tractor if necessary. I expected the tractor to be safe because fire trucks would be there.
The fire of August 18 was not like any fire they could have predicted.
There was no one to help me. I couldn’t get the sawmill out by myself. I couldn’t load the generators.. I tried to get the sawmill moved out but by then, everyone was fighting their own fire. Big Creek was fighting their own fire, putting in a fire break. Fire trucks had been sitting at Big Creek the whole time, not one had pulled a hose out yet.
On Monday August 17, I went down to Big Creek Lumberyard. Fire trucks were still there; no patrol being done at Last Chance. No one even knew there were residents back there. There are over 200 people living back at Last Chance. The Fire Department (visiting) were not given the information that there were any people back there at all.
On Tuesday, August 18, I went to work, servicing swimming pools. I went to see my mom in Felton after work and came home to Davenport around 4pm. There still were not any notices to standby/prepare to evacuate. Nothing. I will never forget that I smelled the smell of animal hair burning.
I saw a lot of smoke, and went out to Waddell to see where the fire was. The Waddell Fire had turned and started to head north. I saw debris rolling down at the big sandstone slides along HWY 1. How odd there were so many windsurfers.
The fire was growing. I drove north and got to Coastways Ranch, where Christine Harper grazes her cows. I called her to tell her to get her cows out as fires were at the fields where her cows were. Luckily she moved them in time.
I started to pack, just in case. I got chainsaws in the car. I parked that car in the middle of the meadow, thinking that the vehicle would be safe and not burn.
A friend called to say they’d be up at 6am the next morning to help me get the rest of my stuff. This was around dinnertime.
The next thing I knew, I heard the fire had jumped the fire line just created at China Grade. This was about ten miles from the farm as the crow flies inland towards Bonny Doon.
My tenant had gone outside to see where the fire might be and looked towards Waddell. The fire was coming and it headed straight for the ranch. I thought the ocean was still making the crazy loud noise, but it was the fire roaring down the valley.
Neighbors were calling to get out now. There was only one exit out and it was now on fire and headed towards the gate. If there was no way to get through that exit, the only other one was to go to the Mill Site, six miles inland. That was already on fire.
Still, there was not one fire truck to be seen.
I asked my tenant Elvin to help load generators. He said the fire was already at the (cattle) gate and it was time to get out now. He was headed back to Big Creek where he was an electrician. He didn’t even get his own stuff out.
I couldn’t load the generators.
I lived in Haze Maze at Last Chance, three miles from HWY 1, inland on a dirt road. I started loading guitars, my deceased husband’s treasures, a 12-string fender guitar, and an old gibson guitar. I was only able to grab pictures from my refrigerator. I was out of time. I saw my deceased husband Carl’s bear skin rug. He shot it years ago in upstate New York. I knew I couldn’t take it. No time to grab any pictures from the walls. I grabbed the dog food, the dog bed, the dog pills and the dog, Carter, the red nose pittie. Sweetest dog there ever was.
I always thought I was coming back, up until the last minute. By then the adrenaline kicked in. My thoughts were getting mixed up, I was thinking I would be able to come back in the morning to get everything else. I secured a few tools. Also two bottles of wine out of a closet full of wine. The fire continued to roar, like the sound of the ocean. But it wasn’t the ocean. The smoke was incredibly thick and dense. It was a ten minute drive to reach HWY 1.
There was so much ash suspended in the air in the light of the flashlight.
Then we got the reverse 911 call, saying the fire was imminent. I got calls from Christine Harper telling me to get out now, that a fireball was headed right towards the farm where Christine lived. A bit north on Whitehouse Canyon road, Christine and residents were also self-evacuating. They, like us, never received an evacuation standby warning, or evacuation mandate. They got the reverse 911 a half hour after everyone was out of the canyon, by then, the entire canyon was ablaze.
This is what I understood had happened: There were five lightning strike fires from that Sunday morning storm. By Tuesday, they were beginning to move towards each other beginning to form a ring of fire. Whitehouse Canyon and Last Chance Ridge were in the center, and the Butano fires were moving south, the other two (Waddell and Ano Nuevo) were moving north. All the residents knew was what they were told, that everything was ok and the authorities kept sending emails saying there were no evacuation standbys or orders to leave anywhere in the area. Why didn’t they see this coming? The Canyon and the Ridge were doomed.
I started packing, taking one suitcase of clean laundry. I took no jacket, no coat, nothing. It was still so hot out. I packed the suitcase, and closed the window. I jumped into the truck and put it in 4-wheel drive. I headed towards the cattle gate, and met up with residents, also driving out. We all met in the fields, the cow pasture by Big Creek, across HWY 1, driving ten minutes to get out of the canyon. The fire was already at Fistalera Road, two miles away. Fire trucks were at the cattle gate, 2 miles away. None were headed to Last Chance Ridge. No one knew there were residents there. The residents needed to get past the fire trucks stopped on the paved portion of the road into Last Chance. The lights on the trucks were blinding the vehicles as they tried to get by. The smoke was so bad. Fistalera is the paved part of the Last Chance Ridge Road leading to Last Chance Ridge. It goes one for one mile before turning into dirt for two more miles. One homeowner on that road had called 911 and said the fire was in his front yard and he was not leaving until they showed up. They showed up and his house was saved. They ended up saving all five homes on Fistalera (I think they are obliged to come help once they get a phone call.) Those five homes were all high end residences.
After most of the residents reached the fields, six fire trucks ended up racing towards the fire. I don’t know where they had been staged up until that time.
What I saw as the beginning of the end was watching the fire creep onto Last Chance Ridge. This was about 11pm. The fire was on top of the Last Chance community.
I left my home at 10:40pm. People were talking about the “Mill Site” and that one person, Tad Jones was missing. Noone knew where Tad was.
I saw the Battalion Commander, Mr. Gonzales. He said they were not going back there (past the paved portion of the road) to Last Chance Ridge. Not one fire truck tried to save any structures back there. Battalion Commander Gonzales said he would not jeopardize his men. My tractor at the top of the Ridge burned, right at the spot where they told me to park it in case of a fire, to keep the road clear so the fire trucks could get through.
The Mill Site had caught fire. The Mill Site was the community social/community center, where we held barn dances. The fire had jumped the lines. Here is where the back end of the Last Chance community was taken out. 250 homes/residences, 50 outbuildings, all burned to the ground. We all watched it burn. I stayed all night and the following morning, watching it. The cattle fields are owned by the family of Big Creek lumber. This is where we all parked. The fire was coming in across the fields where we were parked. Dan and a neighbor and I ushered about a dozen cows to the next field, a field that was not burning.
I had five structures on my land. Barns full of antiques acquired from a previously owned house in Georgia, all burned to the ground, to ashes. Tools of all kinds, compressors, chain saws, sharpening machines, woodworking tools, tractor tools, generators, wood splitters all gone. I had just cut, split and stacked three full cords of wood.
There were over 200 people living up at Last Chance. The Fire department didn’t even know there was a community back there. There were trucks assisting Fire trucks from out of the area that had no idea that 200 people were fleeing. We were on our own.
Everyone left, leaving me and the owner of Big Creek, Ken McCrary and a neighbor Thomas. We watched the fire all night and then watched it smolder in the daylight.
The Water treatment plant, located in the Big Creek cow fields had caught fire. We flagged a fire truck, only to hear them say they had run low on water. The water tender had been in the fields with us, in case the trucks needed more water. Water was still available in some homeowner’s tanks, but they would not fill up their trucks because the water tender had left.
The bulldozers did a great job. I was not sure where they were from. They bulldozed fire breaks to save those five houses on the paved part of the Last Chance access. When they left, everything else was left to burn.
At dawn, Thomas went up Fistalera Drive to count standing houses. He drove only to Glen’s house, one of five that was saved. Fire trucks had only gone to the end of the paved portion of the road.
Davenport only has one FireTruck. It was already six miles in at the Mill Site. CalFire never told the visiting/assisting fire departments that there was a viable community back there called Last Chance with over 200 residents.
I was only able to get to Fistalera Road one mile before encountering a tree across the road. I had to turn back. The fire was now smoldering and still burning south on Swanton Road. This is the same fire that ended up near UCSC, causing a partial evacuation of the campus.
Because of the built up adrenaline, I did not sleep for 48 hours. I went to Whale City Bakery in Davenport. I had to give some folks there the heartbreaking news that their place did not make it. It was so sad. Many were just stunned. All these people and I had built our own homes ourselves at Last Chance Ridge.
What I lost:
~Tractor replacement = $25,000
~Portable mill = $ 40,000
~Generators = $12500 (to replace 4)
~Water tank $~4000
The well was probably saved.
Plumbing needs to be redone. If I only had my tractor, I could clean this up on my own. But it is gone. I really know how to operate a tractor well.
I turned 71 this june. Where retirement should be enjoying what you spent your whole life working towards now put me at ground zero. It is overwhelmingly sad.
I’m not the type of person that thought I would need help, but please know that anything you can contribute to this gofundme will be put towards replacement of the most important things to me. My thanks to all of you for reading this.
https://www.gofundme.com/f/dawn-stevens-lost-everything-in-a-wildfire
37 Ravens 