San Mateo County hotels accommodate fire evacuees

“The whole skyline behind the trees was red — I’ve never seen that before,” he said of the conditions when he left. The smoke was also overwhelming. “I have a heart problem and I couldn’t breathe with the smoke that thick. I couldn’t even see 10 feet in front of me.”

Graham Yates, also a La Honda resident staying with his family at the same hotel, left town two days before the mandatory evacuation was declared. A conversation with a survivor of the devastating Camp Fire in 2018 convinced him to leave early.

“On Tuesday my gut was telling me evacuating is the thing to do and then I ran into a guy who lost everything up in Paradise. The look in his eye was enough. He lost friends and everything he owned up there and that just pushed me over,” Yates said.

La Honda is located in southern San Mateo County and is home to roughly 1,000 people. 

As of Tuesday, the CZU Lightning Complex fires had torched more than 123 square miles in southern San Mateo County and northern Santa Cruz County and destroyed 538 structures. The fires are 19% contained.  

Evacuation centers were quickly established in Half Moon Bay and San Mateo as well as in Santa Cruz County. Normally evacuees could stay overnight at such sites, but because of COVID-19, they’re instead being sent to hotels.

A man who wants to remain anonymous and who is also staying at the Hyatt Regency in Burlingame, fled his home on Last Chance Road near Davenport in Santa Cruz County as flames reached the only road out of town. And that was hours before a mandatory evacuation was declared.

“The fire was just hitting the bottom of the road as I drove out,” he said. “Everyone including horse trailers were on top of each other.”

The man was compelled to leave when a series of emails from neighbors arrived in his inbox that read “evacuate now, everyone get out now.”

“It was very intense,” he said. “And then there were people driving around just screaming ‘get out now.’ It was so heavy.”

The only confirmed fatality of the CZU Lightning Complex fires occurred on Last Chance Road. Authorities identified the victim as 73-year-old Tad Jones.

The series of emails that prompted the man to evacuate came via an email chain established by his neighbors when the fires began. Everyone in the community had signed up for the email chain and the man said it saved lives.

“Without that email chain it would’ve been a disaster with quite a few more deaths,” he said.

The man is grateful to be safe in a hotel, but is desperate to return home.

“Being in a hotel in Burlingame I’m so grateful for it but it’s freaking me out right now. As soon as I can get up there to help I will,” he said. “[Last Chance Road] is the strongest most amazing community I’ve ever lived in. I’ve only been there three years but I’m going to be there to rebuild with these people.”

Bryan Garibaldi, who’s staying at the same Burlingame hotel with his family, was forced to evacuate his home in Loma Mar in southern San Mateo County early last week. But he’s been returning there every night in coordination with fire officials to protect his neighborhood.

“When I saw how spread thin Cal Fire was and the night they left us to go take care of Boulder Creek and Scotts Valley it was just up to the volunteer firefighters so we just stepped up and did the neighborly thing,” he said.

Gariboldi, who has a firefighting background, and a group of neighbors whose homes are along Pescadero Creek have been defending against blazes less than 100 feet away.

With pumps in the creek, every night until sunrise they’ve been hosing down homes and fallen trees, creating defensible space and removing needles and other vegetation from their roofs.

“Things are looking pretty good as of now,” he said, noting all the homes in his neighborhood are still standing. “We’re just doing everything in our power.

“It’s fulfilling in a neighborly aspect,” he continued. “Just seeing all of our neighbors get together for a common cause. Even neighbors you might’ve had disagreements with before — all that stuff is mashed right now and the focus is on the well being of our neighborhood. That gives you the feeling of the right thing to do.”

Yates said many of his neighbors have also taken it upon themselves to fight fires in La Honda. One of them, a farmer, created a fleet of makeshift firefighting vehicles by loading 500-gallon water tanks onto pickup trucks along with pumps and hoses. He and others spend their days driving around looking for spot fires to put out.

Others are creating “huge” firebreaks with bulldozers and flying drones for a bird’s-eye view of the developing fires, he said. At night, they’re keeping an eye on people’s homes and making sure looters don’t show up, he added.

“They’re boys who grew up in the woods who know the area and who’ve run chain saws and stuff their whole lives. The reality of it is they’re probably better qualified than most firefighters,” Yates said.

“It’s a different breed of people,” Morrell said.

zachary@smdailyjournal.com

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