Texas wil be okay

Bastrop County Complex Fire

34,356 acres burned

1,554 homes destroyed

2 lives lost

Single most destructive wildfire in Texas history

(Statue in the picture is in front of the Bastrop Fire Department)

I'm surprised we didn't notice the smoke on our way home from church because the fire started just north of Bastrop at about 11 am on that Sunday. We were relaxing inside after we got home and just stepped outside because Lane and Nate were coming over and we were going outside to meet them. Just as I was walking out the door, I looked up at the sky and thought "It looks like it might storm." Gray clouds filled the sky to the east. Our neighbor's kids (who were visiting her for the weekend) were out in the driveway talking very excitedly about something when another neighbor drove by, sobbing, and was telling everyone we have to leave. (The police were going through our neighborhood with megaphones and also going door-to-door but had not reached our street yet.) The neighbors told us we were supposed to take a change of clothes. The gray clouds in the sky were smoke.
My first thought was that we are pretty deep in the heart of our little subdivision and surely they would get this fire before it got to us. I felt safe. I went inside and immediately started unplugging the computer while Mom H (who was visiting us) loaded the girls in the Jeep. Nate and Lane pulled in about that time and they and Scott were talking. I took the computer out to the Jeep, and then came back into the duplex, thinking about what else to take. I had a plastic grocery sack in my hand and walked through the duplex completely baffled. On the one hand, I felt like this was silly - everything we pack, we will have to unpack in a few hours when we come back, but for a few seconds I was thinking if this was real, what small things would even make a difference if we lose everything else. As it turned out, I threw in my swim suit (it was laying out....that is my defense for why I grabbed something so pointless), then a bunch of diapers for both girls (that was smart), and then I walked past the birth announcements for Lexi that I had ordered that finally came, looked at them and thought it would be ridiculous if that was the one thing I saved if our duplex burned, so I left them there. At the time, I also thought about my camera battery charger because I knew my camera (which was in my purse with me) had a dead battery, but I walked on past, out to the Jeep, and decided it was time for me to get going - mostly because I didn't want Summer to have a fit from waiting in the Jeep too long.
Mom was going to drive Scott's truck, and he was going to take his motorcycle - coming soon, he was just packing some clothes.

It didn't take three minute from the time I left to realize that I was an idiot. This was real. Our subdivision is kinda crazy in that it has very few through streets. There are tons of cul-de-sacs and dead ends. We had to drive towards the fire to get out of the cul-de-sac. There are only two streets out of the subdivision, and already there was a tremendous traffic jam. So we were stuck in traffic and both girls were crying. To my right, a black wall of smoke looked only two blocks away. I had time to think. And suddenly I remembered Penelope. And Nancy, our 80-year-old neighbor. (Her kids were there, so I was relieved, they would take care of her.) I wondered how many other people like her live in our subdivision. And I knew that I wasn't going back for Penelope, but I couldn't think about her being left behind. I called Scott to tell him to leave immediately because the traffic was bad and the fire was bad. He had already left. So we were stuck there. Some people were driving in, some frantic, some completely mellow. Police were driving in. I looked at their faces as they drove past me. One was a young woman. I was glad to be going out.(These pictures are all from Mom H, since...my camera battery was dead.)
It was a relief to finally get to 71 and to be able to drive away from the fire. I was headed to Rassi's. I knew as soon as we were told to evacuate that that is where we'd go. I called Diane on my way to say we were coming. As I was driving that way, I could see smoke ahead of me too.
At church that day, David Brummitt had said "It's a perfect day for a wildfire." And it was -perfect conditions. In the middle of the worst drought in recent history, very low humidity, and a windy day.
Scott caught up to us and got to Rassi's the same time we did. He had weaved through the traffic on Tahitian Drive on his motorcycle. Mom and Lane and Nate were still back there somewhere.
The Rassi's had called the Attebury's and invited them over too by the time we got there. (They live in Tahitian Village too.) Soon they and Mom and Lane and Nate arrived.
The smoke I had seen on my way there was from another fire. There were wildfires all over Texas that night.
(The next several pictures I stole from the internet. Too bad I can't adjust the size.)
That night we crowded around the radio and listened while people called in and told where they were, what they could see, any information they had. (One caller started in on conspiracy theories....his call was cut short.)

I was sure that our duplex was toast and was mulling that over in my head. The whole situation was surreal. We checked the internet and read that 10,000 acres had already burned. No, that can't be right....yes, it is. They said that they could report with confidence that over 300 homes were already lost.
(I wish this picture was bigger - it is so unbelievable.)
Finally we all decided to head to bed. We walked next door to the church - where we would be staying until further notice.

I couldn't sleep anyway, so I sat out on the swing in front of the church. The wind was blowing to the south. We heard about more areas being evacuated. Getting close to where we are building.

Nate and Lane were going to drive out to our house to see what they could see. I decided to ride along. Our house is on a high point, and I thought we would be able to see far. It was after midnight. The roads were busy. We passed the livestock sale barn - parking lot completely full of trailers and all types of animals filling the stalls. I hadn't thought about all the animals that would need to be evacuated. The gas station across the road was full of people and cars parked along the highway. It looked like they were all set to watch a fireworks show. I wondered why they were gathering at the gas station. Mostly, I think people just didn't want to be alone.

We turned onto Glass Lane and passed several vehicles (some with trailers, it's a horse neighborhood) on their way out. It made me uncomfortable. We went inside & upstairs to get a good view. It was hard to tell how far away the fire was. I joked that we were safe because the fire would have to cross the creek on Watterson Road to get to us. (Last year it was a healthy stream, now it a completely dry creekbed.)

I laid awake and thought about a lot of things that night. When the morning came, I didn't have that fresh sense of a new day. It was still windy, the fire was still raging, and the same firefighters who had been out there the night before were probably still fighting and exhausted.

The fire was still moving south. Still 0% contained. We went to convention center and heard that they had not yet started to "fight" the fire on the ground. They were using planes dropping water and fire retardant, but it was too windy and dangerous to get close - they were bulldozing areas to try to stop the fire when it reached that point, but everything up to there was toast.

I think it was at the convention center that I heard someone complain that we weren't getting enough help - send more helicopters, send more firefighters. The person that answered them said "Texas is burning. This isn't the only fire in Texas." It wasn't. (Although it turned out to be the biggest.) Firefighters were spread so thin, by Monday afternoon the fire covered about 30,000 acres. There were 366 firefighters working at that time. (The math on that on is not good, 1 firefighter for every 80 acres.)

The next several days were a blur of watching the flag to see which way the wind was blowing, and how strong the wind was that day. Going to the convention center to see if there was any new information. Governor Perry came to town. “Mobil claims centers” from all the major insurance companies rolled into town. Donation drop off points were established and were swamped with donations so fast that they had to prohibit any more donations. (No exceptions!) A DC-10 was brought in from California to drop fire retardant/water. Fire maps were posted showing the boundaries of the fire (our duplex was inside the burned area). Lists were posted that gave street names and address numbers were listed as "still standing" or "gone". They were not complete - our street was not listed. I watched people come up to the list and find their address. I wondered if people had any inkling before reading the list or if that was how they found out their house was "gone". I thought about whether there was any gentle way to break that to someone.

(The fire started at or very close to the state park.)

I think the fire was within three miles or so of our house. The smoke looked ominous.

The convention center.

I believe this is the state attorney general.

News cameras at the press conference. They did two press conferences a day at the convention center. They also did prayers every hour.

News trucks behind the convention center.

State Farm Mobile Claim center. I believe they were first on the scene.

(These were drive-by photos.)

Filling up parking lots in town.

(Donation distribution center at the front of Tahitian.)
They slowly opened streets again. Tahitian was the last area to be opened. Finally they opened the farthest west part of the subdivision. The homes were mostly untouched except for the farthest east side of the area they opened – four homes in a row were burned to the ground. We were supposed to be able to go home Thursday, no Wednesday, no Thursday. (I considered that if they pushed it back another day there might be an insurrection - it might be led by me.) I felt like we were living in an occupied country. We had to go to the sherriff’s office to get a placard to put in our vehicles so we would be allowed to enter when they did open it finally. There were still fires burning and power lines down. The homes didn’t have power or water anyway. Part of me wondered if they just wanted to delay the inevitable – hundreds of people returning to their homes that are completely gone. Piles of rubble.

The grocery store was giving out water, Gatorade, chips, and cleaning kits.

And what was left...

Anything stone, brick, or metal survived...

Carcasses of washing machines and dryers, ovens....

Here is our duplex - picture taken from Nancy's side. The fire came between our duplex and the neighbor's. Took out the neighbor's wooden fence, burned her deck (can't see it in this picture), windows cracked from the heat.

The fire came from behind our duplex. It is easy to see where the firefighters cleared an area to stop the fire in front of the woods behind the duplex. They also moved our lawn mower away from our duplex and they tossed all of the firewood that we had stacked by the side of the house away from the house into the yard. Before they posted the list of houses still standing vs. gone, they said as a general rule, they were able to save houses that had space around them - not too close to the trees and not too much stuff close to the house, where they could try to clear and wet down an area to stop the fire. In some areas, the fire was just raging though, and all houses were lost.

Every house had those green papers on them. The firefighters left them, I think they did quick searches that the houses were evacuated. If they could see pets inside, they broke into houses to rescue pets. Destini was with me when we came back for the first time. As we were walking up to the duplex, she said "I heard a meow!!" Although we hadn't talked about it, I guess others besides me were worried about Penelope. We were evacuated for eleven days. She didn't have food or water. She was okay. I was so happy to see her. When I was laying awake the first night we were evacuated, I thought I would be okay if Penelope didn't survive, but then the middle of the next day, Summer started saying "kitty" and looking around for her, and I thought it would break my heart if we lost Penelope and Summer would miss her. A firefighter had left her some water. I signed her in at this pet place, and they said they would try to get food and water to her, and they did get water to her. He must have locked the front door on the way out too. That was nice. There were reports that looters were sneaking in before we were allowed to get back into our neighborhood. Scott's guns are right inside the door - a hot item for looters. I thought it'd be a pity to lose them, and we left our door unlocked. Anyway, not sure if the stories were really true about the looters or not, but it was nice that our door was locked anyway. (Not that we knew that until we got there, but anyway.....)

The landscape is so different already because the fire cleared out all the brush that was growing between the trees, so everything seems so much more open. I can see the next street over and houses that used to be hidden in the trees and other stuff - people's yards, etc.

Already there are piles of tree removal trucks working all day. At night they are just lined up in all the empty parking lots in the area.

So far, I've seen so many trucks and trailers full of burned up scrap metal. People are cleaning up their lots. There is one house on the main road that I have driven by many times and seen the people digging through the ashes.

There is a tremendous amount of advertising by homebuilders. New billboards, and signs all over the place.

(Metal roof is all that's left of this house.)

There is a lot of rebuilding to be done around here.

On Sunday afternoon we drove down one road with Grant - about two miles or so. I think there were only three houses left standing in the distance we drove. All the rest looked like these pictures. After a while, he said "I think I get the idea. These houses are just all gone."

(Grocery store tent giving away water, supplies, etc.)

The fire crossed this highway - used to be a beautiful drive - now the trees are all black.

This was one house that was saved in a neighborhood where all of the other houses were gone.

There used to be a house there.

These pictures could go on and on....1554 times.

Someone asked Rick Perry about the wildfires in Texas as he was campaigning and he said "Texas will be okay. Texans take care of Texans." And it's true. And we have been well taken care of throughout it all, by our neighbors and friends here, but also definitely by the people we love and care about everywhere, and we are so thankful. May God richly bless you all.