Mink Creek fire

When my parents lived in Mink Creek in the 90's, I thought that it was an absolutely ideal place to live.  Although you could be in town in just a few minutes, you could also stand on the deck and smell that you were in the forest.  I loved that smell.  Now the smell is charred and the beautiful landscape is interrupted by burnt-out skeletons of homes and vehicles. 

 

A fire, started from an accidental spark from a vehicle, began in the dry conditions on Charlotte Street and burned 66 homes before it could be contained.  Firemen from neighboring counties and states came to help battle the blaze, since many of our own firemen were in Colorado fighting the devastating fires there.  It was amazing that more homes weren't destroyed, since the dry conditions and high winds drove the fire directly to the Indian Hills neighborhood, with hundreds of homes in its path.  Gratitude for these brave firefighters was evident in signs all throughout the Mink Creek area.

Del and I drove the kids to the area a week later to see if my parents' old home was still standing.  We had heard that it might have burned down and we were anxious to see. I couldn't take a picture of the home without going onto the front lawn, so I just took a picture of the back driveway, which serves as a dividing line for two properties.  My parents' house to the right was untouched, but the house to the left was completely destroyed, as well as the houses across the street.

We drove up into the hills and saw that many, many homes were now just burnt rubble.  We were surprised at how little there was left on each property.  The fire consumed most things, leaving very little evidence of all of the stuff we prize so much and fill our houses with.  It was interesting to see how one house would be spared and the neighboring one would be completely gone.  The wind had been so strong that it had blown sparks everywhere and constantly changed the direction of the fire.

At one property, the house was gone and the trees were blackened, but a deer had found some refuge there.

  Down the road, we saw a mother nursing two fawns on the front lawn of an untouched house.  It must have seemed like a safe place for her and her babies.

  It has been quite a shock for our community, but it is always amazing how tragedies can bring out the best in people.  Donations began pouring in so fast that officials had to ask people to wait until they could determine what the needs were.  Then the community began having fundraisers to help those who hadn't been insured.  Fortunately, it was determined later that all homes were insured (even though two families had defaulted on payments and thought they were uninsured, their banks had maintained payments). The LDS church organized a huge clean-up a week later and had over 2,000 men available to help clear the properties.  They came armed with chainsaws, trucks, shovels, and some willing hearts.  Del and Devin were happy to be helping, although they were pretty dirty and tired by the time the day was over.  Each homeowner, some with houses that were saved and some with houses that weren't, had been assigned a group of men and a truck.  The men cut trees and garbage and hauled them to the dump, as well as doing anything else the homeowner needed. There will be more clean-ups over the next few months, but none as big as this one.  We have also been collecting needed supplies for a family who is staying with relatives in our ward, the Lambsons.  They had a list of immediate needs and it was nice to be able to help. I had found a beautiful, new set of scriptures in a case at a yard sale the previous week and had bought it, although no one in our family needs another one, so I took it to her with some other things our ward had collected.  It had the previous owner's name on the cover, Agnes something, but other than that it had never been used.  Sis. Lambson told me that she marked her first scripture in it the next day and it made her cry.  She said it was her favorite donation.  It's been a sad thing for our community but a great opportunity to pull together and help each other out.