4 ms·

I was in Paradise the morning of the fire. Does anyone have any questions?

by psynch 8y ago

Diederich 8y ago
Have you lived there? I heard that the town had done some sort of evacuation practice after a big fire in ...2008 I believe? How did the previous practice inform the evacuation this time?
- psynch 8y ago
  Yes, I've lived in Paradise many years and was in town for the 2008 fire. I heard that since the 2008 fire the town debated making bigger roads but instead decided on breaking the town into zones and evacuating by zone. This fire was very unusual in that within a couple of hours it seemed to have spread to many location across town. At my location by 745am (the fire begin 10 miles from town at 630am) there were many bits of burnt bark and leaves raining down all around. Many of these were likely falling in different locations as embers. The town is in an area of frequent fires, it's not uncommon to have nearby fires, they generally move in the order of a day so a zoned evacuation in many normal cases could work. I've never seen a fire that moved this quickly.
  - Diederich 8y ago
    Thanks for your assessment. > I've never seen a fire that moved this quickly. I've been hearing a lot of this of late.
HillaryBriss 8y ago
how did you evacuate? did you take one car by yourself or share a ride with others?
- psynch 8y ago
  That morning I had gotten up somewhat early to do some work, around 745 the light outside was redder than it should be. Going outside I found smoke high in the air and large bits of burnt material falling. An online fire map showed a small fire had started 10 miles north east of town. The weather map showed a 17mph wind headed south west. Out of caution we started packing a few things just in case we get an evacuation notice. However, after 30 minutes or so listening to an online emergency radio scanner and searching social media it became clear we needed to leave. Within an hour we had our 4runner packed and around 9am we were heading out, the sky had now turned dark like night and we encountered normal traffic. We stopped at our office to grab a flat of water, while there got a robocall (landline) notification to evacuate. We headed out of town and just a mile down the road (south middle of town) we saw a large patch of fire burning a few hundred feet from the road. Paradise has essentially 3 roads out, two of them are two lane roads. Often when there's a fire at least one or two can be blocked by fire. We evacuated by car, one car, we could have taken two but decided to stick together in one. Five of us.
psynch 8y ago
Paradise is small mountain retirement town situated between two canyons. Very wooded, most roads aren't wide and don't have sidewalks, mostly wooden houses and mobile homes. Essentially a forest full of homes. From what I can tell from personal and firsthand accounts the fire was burning in places all across town within 3 hours. The whole town of 27,000+ people needed to leave at once, a very challenging situation.

I was in Paradise the morning of the fire. Does anyone have any questions?

by psynch 8y ago

I was in Paradise the morning of the fire. Does anyone have any questions?

Have you lived there? I heard that the town had done some sort of evacuation practice after a big fire in ...2008 I believe? How did the previous practice inform the evacuation this time?

psynch 8y ago
Yes, I've lived in Paradise many years and was in town for the 2008 fire. I heard that since the 2008 fire the town debated making bigger roads but instead decided on breaking the town into zones and evacuating by zone. This fire was very unusual in that within a couple of hours it seemed to have spread to many location across town. At my location by 745am (the fire begin 10 miles from town at 630am) there were many bits of burnt bark and leaves raining down all around. Many of these were likely falling in different locations as embers. The town is in an area of frequent fires, it's not uncommon to have nearby fires, they generally move in the order of a day so a zoned evacuation in many normal cases could work. I've never seen a fire that moved this quickly.
- Diederich 8y ago
  Thanks for your assessment. > I've never seen a fire that moved this quickly. I've been hearing a lot of this of late.

HillaryBriss 8y ago

how did you evacuate? did you take one car by yourself or share a ride with others?

psynch 8y ago
That morning I had gotten up somewhat early to do some work, around 745 the light outside was redder than it should be. Going outside I found smoke high in the air and large bits of burnt material falling. An online fire map showed a small fire had started 10 miles north east of town. The weather map showed a 17mph wind headed south west. Out of caution we started packing a few things just in case we get an evacuation notice. However, after 30 minutes or so listening to an online emergency radio scanner and searching social media it became clear we needed to leave. Within an hour we had our 4runner packed and around 9am we were heading out, the sky had now turned dark like night and we encountered normal traffic. We stopped at our office to grab a flat of water, while there got a robocall (landline) notification to evacuate. We headed out of town and just a mile down the road (south middle of town) we saw a large patch of fire burning a few hundred feet from the road. Paradise has essentially 3 roads out, two of them are two lane roads. Often when there's a fire at least one or two can be blocked by fire. We evacuated by car, one car, we could have taken two but decided to stick together in one. Five of us.

psynch 8y ago

Paradise is small mountain retirement town situated between two canyons. Very wooded, most roads aren't wide and don't have sidewalks, mostly wooden houses and mobile homes. Essentially a forest full of homes. From what I can tell from personal and firsthand accounts the fire was burning in places all across town within 3 hours. The whole town of 27,000+ people needed to leave at once, a very challenging situation.