HAVILAH, Calif. (KERO) — The Borel Fire reached full containment on this day one year ago, and even now, stories continue to ignite memories of the destruction and the desperate efforts by fire crews to save property, including their own.
I went back to Havilah to visit a U.S. Forest Service Work Center that was surrounded at the height of the firestorm and survived.
When the Borel Fire started in the Kern River Canyon, Daniel Wild with the Forest Service Kern River District was in his patrol unit, looking 'down' on it.
"My patrol area is above where the fire was, so I went up to look at things in advance of the fire," said Wild. During the initial 48 hours, the fire moved slowly, and many crews were able to be proactive, conducting further hazard reduction efforts, even at their own work center south of Havilah.
"We were limbing up all the trees, cutting down brush," said Ryan Lobre, a USFS Battalion Chief, "it didn't look necessarily scary or anything at that point."
But as we know now, on July 26th, high winds whipped the flames and embers into a firestorm, catching a large number of resources at the work center.
"I turned around and came into the parking lot here. There was fire running across this ridge, just behind station," said Lobre, "this is within a minute and a half, moved across here, down through this drainage in the back."
And in five minutes, he said they were surrounded.
"Everybody was on nozzles, everybody doing what they needed to do, take care of this place," said Lobre, "we eventually had to hook the engine up to the hydrant because it didn't have enough pressure." Lobre said he headed out to the road and began walking towards the barracks about a quarter mile away when the fire cut him off.
"When you have fire behavior like that, there's not a whole lot we can do," said Lobre, "suddenly, there was more fire than I'd ever seen in my life. So I ran back down the road, almost got run over by the division's truck, he's like... get in, OK.”
"People were coming in, some trying to help their families and friends evacuate," said Wild, "there was one guy who wanted to go in and get his grandma, at that time, like it was too late for anyone to go in. We already had, you know, fire resources being entrapped, forced to retreat, and I had to tell them no."
"Generally, when it starts getting close, we pull out, and yeah, it was pretty close, there's a lot of fire... a lot of fire," said Lobre.
In the end, everyone made it out, and there were no fatalities. More than 59,000 acres burned, 223 structures were destroyed, and another 29 were damaged.
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