Said Beverly Fillmore, 87, who drove out of the Paradise fire, quoted
in The Mercury News.
The inferno has claimed at least 23 people so far — six in vehicles, another just outside one — as the Camp Fire roared to life Thursday morning.... More than ever, it seems, those trapped by wildfires aren’t just the stubborn few who refuse to evacuate. California wildfires are increasingly wicked fast — with year-round fire season colliding with late-autumn near-hurricane strength winds — giving people little time to think straight, much less escape....
There are several great stories in that article. Here's another couple, who seem to be around 60 years old:
Richard and Zetta Gore abandoned their vehicle and, with the fire bearing down.... “I said, ‘Zetta, it’s time,’” Richard said. “We both prayed together and asked for God’s protection and took off....We were sitting ducks to be burned in our vehicles and if I was going to die in a forest fire.... I would rather die with my wife, trying to get away, than sitting in a vehicle dying.”....
Into the deep ravine they went, each holding bags with lap blankets and water bottles they could douse if the fire overcame them. They grabbed for vines and bushes as they slid.... They made it to the bottom of the canyon, waded through the creek, then followed the dirt road for five miles before they hitched a ride out.
“We both were ready to die,” Richard said, “but we were not going to die without putting up a fight.”
Posts
84 comments:
Wow, good for them! Gutsy couple!
“but we were not going to die without putting up a fight.”
I thought the rule was that you stopped fighting if you're over 85.
95 is the new 85.
“We both were ready to die,” Richard said, “but we were not going to die without putting up a fight.”
And that is exactly what winners do.
@Fernandistein
I've tweaked the post to make it more apparent that these are 2 different couples. The really elderly couple got out in their car.
I don't know how deep the canyon they slid down was, but this reminds me of 9/11 and the preference people had for falling a great distance over staying put for incineration.
Republicans are happy to see California burn.
It's part of their plan to destroy the state, crash a huge portion of America's tax base and then use the deficit (the current $1 trillion is obviously not large enough) as an argument to finally end the spending entitlements that the red states are the primary beneficiaries of in the first place.
One would think it more efficient to just end the red state spending entitlements, but Republicans are running the government state after all. Since when do they do things efficiently?
Drop RitmoPeePee on the fire.
A bag of wet shit is an effective fire fighting tool.
“We both were ready to die,” Richard said, “but we were not going to die without putting up a fight.”
There's something very American in the sentiment.
And more of it comes out of your mouth than from any other source, Darrell.
This is why I built an air raid shelter under my house. It works for fire, tornado, and thermo-nuclear weapons less than 100 megatons.
Well, that's what it says on the warranty, and God knows lawyers never lie.
They were lucky not to run into a Mountain Lion. Wouldn't that be ironic to have one leap on you just as you reach safety?
Pee-Pee is glad to believe "Republicans are happy to see California burn." Of course it isn't true that Republicans are happy to see California burn. But that doesn't matter. Believing it's true gives Pee-Pee something more to bitch about. And that is what he's committed to — bitching. It's what losers do. It gives them a purpose. Their highest purpose.
"There's something very American in the sentiment."
Churchillian even.
giving people little time to think straight, much less escape....
Of course, if they thought straight, they probably would have escaped California a long time ago
The fighting couple rock though.
All of america is always told: "Shelter in Place!" but they thought: "Die Fighting!"
ps. i'm sure Meade knows, that Churchill was an American
Of course it isn't true that Republicans are happy to see California burn.
Of course it's true. What are they doing to stop it? I mean, aside from muzzling NASA's, NOAA's and EPA's scientists on the causes?
Believing it's true gives Pee-Pee something more to bitch about.
If it weren't true I wouldn't bitch about it. Better than gawking at it, as your Republipets are so fond of doing.
And that is what he's committed to — bitching. It's what losers do. It gives them a purpose.
Interesting that you instead find purpose in lazy complacency and denialism. Not sure when those things ever led to winning anything. But then, I don't rely on matrimonial welfare to enhance my social status.
Careful, Larry. You don't want to end up like the Xanax-addicted househusbands of the 1950s. Complacency only gets you so far in life.
Their highest purpose.
Why do are you so anti-science, Larry? Did a science teacher molest you in grade school, or something?
'wicked fast' is an apt description of the speed of the fires. Winds of 40 mph or more push the fire out in front, almost like throwing molotov cocktails ahead. I grew up in both Northern and Southern California, and when the Santa Ana winds come it is like a different country. Raymond Chandler wrote about the weirdness that comes with the winds. When fires start, they jump 2 or 3 football fields a minute. My nephew, his wife and 3 young boys escaped the Malibu fires, driving on the PCH, the police stopped North bound traffic and all lanes were devoted to getting people out. House and neighborhood gone, just cement and block left. When the rains come this year, it will be mud and land slides.
i have friends in N. Cal who were burned out last year. But according to the asshat a few posts above, I am cheering the death and destruction.
Also, for those that read American Digest, Gerard VanderLeun lost everything, but is safe. He's staying with his 94 yo mom.
I am the last person you want to get religious around in times of danger:
As soon as that woman started praying, I would've put this on - LOUD - just so I could A) concentrate, or B) shut her up, or C) maybe get a better story out of it as she starts really freaking out.
Atheists in foxholes are actually hilarious.
Churchillian even.
@Meade, Churchill's mother was American. Coincidence?
Die Hard
Sorry PPTape, but Drumpf is right about his assessment. In the olden days of clear cutting, the Forests in the west were denuded, then often the slash was burned. After the forest grew back, they were fucked up because hardwoods filled in where the conifers once dominated. Then Smokey the Bear was used to promote the fighting of all fires. These two factors resulted in building up unprecedented fuel loads. Couple with the ever expanding urban development into wildlands, we now get conflagrations. "Environmentalists" have fought all efforts to use selective harvesting and forest fuel management to help reduce the wildland fire danger. This is your science denial and it is the science denial of the global warmer political agenda. Literally the path to hell
They made it to the bottom of the canyon, waded through the creek, then followed the dirt road for five miles before they hitched a ride out.
Didn't they know hitchhiking, especially in California, is dangerous?
...the science denial of the global warmer political agenda. Literally the path to hell
There's no point in taking anything you say about forest management seriously when you basically end on your coda of denying the factual necessity that links climate with atmosphere. How are those forest fires on the moon or in outer space? Droughts can be measured; your denialism depends on pretending that they can't. CO2 can not only be measured but shown to be the major factor in allowing earth to maintain any warmth. Your denialism, again, depends on pretending it can't.
Drumpf is right about his assessment.
Drumpf doesn't make "assessments," he says about 20 lies a week, doesn't mind being caught in them (except when they're politically problematic, as when called out on the "caravan" post-election - that's when he gets REALLY ANGRY), and thinks all truth revolves around what works for his deformed ego.
"I would rather die with my wife, trying to get away, than sitting in a vehicle dying"
“but we were not going to die without putting up a fight”
Their fighting spirit reminded me of Frank Sinatra,
'Cause he had high hopes, he had high hopes
He had high apple pie, in the sky hopes
I am boycotting recount stories, they are depressing. Instead I will blog about people being burnt alive, and whole towns destroyed.
Howard proves honest on this and that makes his attempts at humor more forgivable.
PPTape needs to change her tampon. I agree CO2 is a WMGHG likely responsible for increasing the average temperature by some 0.6K since 1900. I also believe in progressive decarbonization. What I don't believe in is lazy thinking that one single feature, CO2, is the primary driver of forest fires. Landuse is the #1 cause after the natural proclivity for forest fires in the arid west. This is actually good news because CO2 is not getting fixed, but we can change landuse policies and have immediate impacts to reduce fire danger.
Some links on a pesky 59 degree F difference between having the atmosphere we have and having the atmosphere that the denialists pretend might be what's keeping us globally from an average planetary temperature of water's freezing point:
https://www.acs.org/content/acs/en/climatescience/climatesciencenarratives/what-is-the-greenhouse-effect.html
https://www.giss.nasa.gov/research/briefs/ma_01/
http://ase.tufts.edu/cosmos/view_chapter.asp?id=21
You know, from those activists and losers and complainers at the American Chemical Society, NASA, and - just to piss you haters and conspiracy theorists off - a university.
What I don't believe in is lazy thinking that one single feature, CO2, is the primary driver of forest fires.
That's good, because Republicans believe that many features are the cause of nothing in general. Or the cause of everything. It's hard to keep track of what's what when against all economic and political clout you decide to cling to the age-old superstition that says the natural laws of the physical universe can actually exist without first seeking permission to do so from the fossil fuel lobbies.
So please forgive my emphasis, Howard. I'm sure it would be easier to separate signal from noise on both sides if we didn't have the obscene spectacle of Kansas congressmen bringing snowballs into the House of Representatives as "poof' that Arrhenius was wrong.
Life is a bit*h and then you die.
Once we all get on board with Climate Hysterics' program, the climate will get back to perfect, the way God intended it to be, and the way it was before the industrial revolution pollution.
Or at least back to the way it was for the last 10,000 years since the agricultural revolution, which allowed civilization to exist in the first place, increase its human population from 5 million to several billions, grow crops to feed ourselves and accomplish all sorts of wonderful things that Republicans evidently think are very bad and want to reverse.
California is going to have a massive earthquake and sink into the ocean, just like Atlantis.
All scientists agree. Scientific fact.
Here's a scientific observation:
How many posts will it take for FullMoon to post to get across his belief that nothing in the world is or can be known, or at least known to a greater degree than he is capable of knowing anything?
Let's observe and chart the results.
Atheists are pessimists. They have no hope!
How many minutes will go by before FullMoon posts more evidence of what he doesn't know and has decreed that no one should ever be allowed to know?
This long, maybe?
Global cooling and over population will destroy mankind.
Scientific fact
So far 6 posts of what he doesn't know anything about and wants to think you shouldn't either.
Ignorance is contagious, he must believe.
Would you hire a contractor who is anti-measurement? Hahaha. Too funny.
PP is not a scientist, and that is a fact.
Blogger President Pee-Pee Tape said...
Or at least back to the way it was for the last 10,000 years since the agricultural revolution, which allowed civilization to exist in the first place, increase its human population from 5 million to several billions, grow crops to feed ourselves and accomplish all sorts of wonderful things that Republicans evidently think are very bad and want to reverse.
Global warming caused the agricultural revolution. As far as the so-called stability of the Holocene climate, ask The Anasazi
Howard bitch slapped PP, and that is a fact.
Humans are capable of adaptation
They are also capable of killing themselves and creating unnecessary disasters for themselves.
Usually because they couldn't tell the difference between safety and money.
Scientific fact.
...and evolution.
Scientific fact.
Human inheritable DNA mutations that may be beneficial are chance occurrences that take a long time to occur - if they even do, cannot be "made" by human beings, and do not make the agricultural revolution's conditions unnecessary. They do not cause cities to move away from water bodies. They do not change the fundamentals of civilization any more than Exxon Mobil thinks it can do so.
Scientific facts.
FullMoon does not even know what evolution is.
Global warming caused the agricultural revolution.
Not of the uncontrolled man-made variety that has no end in sight. Do you believe in what you wrote at 11:07 or was that just some CYA stuff to not be thought a total kook?
un imaginative and boring.
Moonjob don't know the difference between facts and what bores or entertains someone as unteachable as he is.
Fact.
Moonjob probably doesn't also know the difference between fact and fiction.
Nuclear power is the answer.
That is a scientific fact.
Real scientists agree.
Hysterics are afraid of the obvious solution.
...rigid...
And what you take to be "thinking" is just you being "limp."
Since when are you interested in "scientific information?" I thought you just wanted to be entertained.
Do you imagine guys in lab coats entering coliseums and doing gladiatorial combat with each other, or something?
What kind of acid did you do to blow your mind to a state that's that far gone?
This would be an interesting scientific hypothesis to investigate. What makes Moonjob so dumb, but self-righteously confident in what he doesn't know? Leading scientists are looking to answer that very question.
Stupidity is the future of humanity. Moonjob is a case study in Idiocracy.
Over population !!
Global cooling !!
Scientific facts.
Well moon job, there's one way to stop yourself from getting old: You can kill yourself.
In fact, I highly recommend you do it. Now, preferably.
Come on. You know your parents won't miss you. And isn't your only family your wife's family anyway?
Nuclear power is the answer.
Is it created by evolution?
LOL.
The end of the last ice age was about as out of control as you can get. The glacial melting provided the water to cultivate civilization in the middle east but it was only temporary. Desertification then took over making it the asshole of the world with IBS. All before the industrial revolution. Proof of the devastation of natural climate change is it was so catastrophic, it spawned monotheism.
PP is fifty seven year old incel.
That is a fact.
Is this the age your dad would be if he hadn't been jailed for having sex with you or something?
PP smokes cigarettes and litters.
That is a fact.
I believe Democrats will eventually offer a Final Solution to glowball warnening.
The potential answers to their perceived problems are rejected.
That leads me to believe they have an alternative, but Final, Solution in mind.
PP is Poo Poo
Scientific fact
Proof of the devastation of natural climate change is it was so catastrophic, it spawned monotheism.
Very good. True. Just not sure why AGW would be better. Isn't the whole point of civilization to regulate disasters rather than to seek to create uncertainty and instability in things we kind of massively rely on?
Again, your 11:07 seems to answer that already.
And just think. There was a time when the comment section of this blog was interesting reading.
I've always liked Richard Dawkins coinage of "meme" the mental equivalent of the biological gene, that exists to replicates itself, at whatever expense to the individual host. Perhaps because it echoes with "mimeograph," the duplication technology of my grade school years.
PPT, based on all his postings here, is nothing more than a leftist meme vehicle, a mimeograph machine mindlessly cranking out memes downloaded from lefty websites. No independent mental editing function intrudes. Kachunk, kachunk, kachunk.
every healthy organism struggles for its survival.
can you be a healthy snowflake?
Don't worry, robother. There is no way that the mindlessness of my postings will ever beat the mindlessness of the right-wing meme machine. And not only are your side's memes more mindless, they are more effective - at least in terms of getting policy, that's bought-and-paid for by well-monied conflicting industrial interests, to prevail.
Once again, I must concede your demand that the physical laws of the universe should yield to Exxon-Mobil for permission to exist. That is how - according to our right-wing government - it currently works and should work, according to you, right?
Republicans, and others, are tired of rescuing Cali from what are clearly profoundly self destructive behaviors. Fight for the right to paaaartay! Douche nozzles.
Fires in Cali disproportionately impact republicans
Ritmo wants people to die so he can blame Republicans. What a charming fellow.
If I lived in a Malibu beach house, I would have far more acceptance of losing my house to a hurricane than to a forest fire. Tsunamis and earthquakes would also be acceptable. Forest fires and cholera epidemics should not be considered acts of God.
In Malibu? There are republicans in Malibu?
2016 votes Ca. How many in your state?
Donald J. Trump Republican 4,483,810
Butte County, (Camp Fire location)
Trump 46.5 percent
FM: Butt Co skewed to Chico #1 flat-land Party school in Cali. The Hill peoples got burned out.
2016 votes Ca. How many in your state?
Donald J. Trump Republican 4,483,810
Butte County, (Camp Fire location)
Trump 46.5 percent
My County in 2016 Trump 65.6%
The County 8 mile from my location Trump 72.7%
Yeah. We really want the forests to burn up. Not....since we are surrounded by forest. Our personnel, neighbors and volunteer fire departments send men and equipment to many of the fires.
Forest fires and cholera epidemics should not be considered acts of God.
Why not forest fires? Many are caused by lightning. Who sends down bolts of lightning other than God....and maybe PG%E it seems in this latest fire that wiped out Paradise.
France get's most of it's energy from nuclear power plants.
They get the USA to take their nuclear waste for free, by telling them that people in Libya will buy it.
President Pee-Pee Tape said...
Republicans are happy to see California burn.
Oh my fuck, Ritmo, they won't let them log on clear deadwood or do any of the forestry practices that you would do if you actually DID want to prevent forest fires! Do t you know about this? Or are you just gaslighting again?
I was talking to a friend about the fires today - I'm from Southern Cali, he's from Northern - and neither of us cares. Rich fucks, who vote against us and call us names, becoming homeless themselves? Hilarity ensues.
Some people just want to watch the whole thing burn - if whites are going to be assholes.
That's your legacy.
California in a nutshell.
I'm happy to read that Camile Grammer (Kelsey's ex) was able, with the help of fire fighters(!), to save her Ferrari collection.
I am sure that was a comfort to those who lost everything w/o a fire fighter in sight.
After reading Crack's comment, I have to observe that some people make it very hard to love them.
The problem with revenge as a model is that it can snowball. If you don't care about your enemy, why should he care about you? The most profound evil the left has done is to work very hard to turn us back into tribes.
All tribes have is vengeance. You kill one of ours, we kill one of yours. A large section of the Old Testament provides for lawful vengeance, with cities of refuge, and attempts to limit revenge. If we are not a nation of laws, we don't even share a common culture of how to do vengeance.
America is an anomaly. It has been possible to come from anywhere and become an American. Not perfectly, not without bloodshed, not without a crucible to melt tribes, who came from places where they had lived as a tribe without assimilation for hundreds of years, into a strange amalgam.
I am an American. Not German, not Spanish, not any one of the many parts that make me whole. We need to stop rewarding those who celebrate the 1/1024 that they can use as a club.
In 1960 Kennedy stole the election, (Illinois, Texas, Hawaii). Nixon didn't challenge the cheating. Landslide Lyndon was rewarded for cheating. The Minnesota senate seat stolen. The Washington governor race stolen. Democrats cheat.
At some point we stop doing elections, and go straight to shooting. We are in a very dangerous time. It can (and I hope not) get much worse. I have just finished reading "Red Famine" about Stalin's human caused famine in the Ukraine that killed almost 5 million. His Marxist assumptions about human nature, have killed 100 million in the past 100 years. The left is a contractor working on a house, who doesn't understand bearing walls.
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