| As a homeowner in Nevada I am no stranger to natural disasters. Flooding waters, wildfires, blizzards, and extremely high winds constantly remind me why I pay for home insurance every month. If there is one thing to be said about Nevada it's that even with all the technological advancements we make we are still at the whims of Mother Nature. |  |
| Me and my wife watched nervously as the fire creep up over the hill with its path set straight towards our neighborhood. The fire had already charred 10 square miles and with a wall of fire 15 feet high our hopes were being channel into getting away safely rather than saving our house. It was to the point where we started stacking our most important possessions by the door. A lot of clothes and valuables, as well as important documents, and irreplaceable pictures found themselves in a single pile. It's a weird feeling deciding what to take with you; people work their whole lives to buy a house and fill it with their life, and in less then an hour we were forced to narrow everything we wanted to continue owning into a single carload. |  |
 |
As the fire crept closer fire planes franticly dropped loads of fire retardant while fire fighters on the ground hurried to clear sagebrush in an attempt to create a fire line. I remember seeing the wall of fire just 100 feet away from some of our neighbors and started loading up the car with our things. Rumors from the firefighters circulated around the neighborhood suggested that campers had started the fire. It seemed ironic at the time that a single group of campers would cause so much destruction. But perhaps ironic is too light a word, certainly there were some harsher things being muttered under the breath as everyone watched as the fire crept closer.
|
 |
Just as it seemed like the battle was lost the fire fighters began taking the lead and in a pleasantly surprising rate they had the fire under control. By noon on august the 13th we were assured by the fire fighters that everything was contained. So as quickly as a gust of wind through washoe, the fire was contained. In a matter of a single day we had gone from certain loss to unexpected safety all started by careless campers, and prevented by the heros in the Reno Fire Department
|
Pointers of Interest