After days of record heat that soared into the triple digits — 14 degrees higher than normal — high winds kicked up last week, and Spokane County became a tinderbox.
In 48 hours, the county saw more than 20,000 acres go up in flames, with at least 265 structures destroyed, two people killed and hundreds of Inland Northwest residents left wondering what to do next.
The first signs of trouble came at 12:27 pm on Friday, Aug. 18, as a fire was reported in a field off Gray Road southwest of Medical Lake. In just 30 minutes the fire grew to around 300 acres, with the wind pushing the blaze to the northeast.
Within an hour, a "Go Now" evacuation order was issued for the area just south of Medical Lake, while captive residents at Eastern State Hospital, Martin Hall Juvenile Detention Center and Pine Lodge Correction Center were told to shelter in place.
Evacuation orders were given to Silver Lake (located just southeast of Medical Lake), and, a bit farther east, those in the Four Lakes area were told to get ready to leave their homes. By 2:20 pm all of Medical Lake was told to evacuate immediately.
State resources started arriving to help battle the flames, and then more bad news arrived by 4:30 pm, when a two-acre timber fire was reported near Elk, off Oregon Road 30 miles north of Spokane. Within 15 minutes, evacuations were issued north to the county line as the fire quickly swelled. By 6:45 pm it was estimated to be larger than 1,500 acres and growing.
By Saturday, the Gray Fire and the Oregon Fire were estimated around 9,000 acres each, and thousands of evacuees who had fled their homes waited to learn if they'd be able to return.
On Sunday, yet another fire started near Thorpe Road — an area within Spokane city limits. Luckily, crews got that 15-acre blaze under control quickly, avoiding a third disaster that could've led to mass evacuations in the city of Spokane.
By Monday, much of Medical Lake remained without power, and residents were still waiting to learn when they could return to check on their homes, if they had homes to return to.
The fast-moving fires sparked a state of emergency. A rainy Tuesday brought relief but was small solace for the hundreds left without homes.
"We've all got to pull together now more than ever," said Gov. Jay Inslee, who visited on Sunday to meet with families, first responders and area officials. On Monday, Inslee said he spoke to President Joe Biden, who shared his concern about the fires and "agreed that worsening wildfires are a consequence of a changing climate bringing hotter and drier conditions to our region."
MOVING LIKE A TRAIN
Jerry Hamilton thought he was hallucinating.
When he looked out his Medical Lake apartment window on Friday afternoon, Hamilton says he saw 20-foot-tall flames just 15 feet away. His building, Hearthstone Senior Apartments, sits on the eastern edge of Medical Lake, next to the local middle school where the town meets the forest.
The fire was as loud as a hurricane, Hamilton says, and moving like a train. Vibrant orange and red hues twisted and roared with the wind. He could hear neighbors screaming.
"I ain't never seen nothing like it in my life," Hamilton says. A police officer — Hamilton thinks it was Spokane city police — banged on the apartment door.
"Hey, you're going now," the officer told him.
Hamilton grabbed a few things. He tried bringing a heavy suitcase, but the officer told him to leave it.
"Dude, you're not pulling it out. We gotta go," the officer said.
Hamilton says he was mesmerized by the fire, and that the officer had to literally drag him out of there. It wasn't until Hamilton got outside that he realized how bad it was.
"I looked over the apartment and I go, 'Oh my God, I wasn't hallucinating — that was fire!'" Hamilton says.
The officer drove Hamilton and three others to Medical Lake High School. But the fire was following.
Fifteen minutes later, Hamilton says they were back on the road toward Cheney High School, where he stayed for four hours or so. Then the winds shifted, and Hamilton had to flee once more, this time to Spokane Falls Community College on a Spokane Transit Authority bus. The driver told him she'd been working since 4:30 that morning. She's a hero, Hamilton says. (The schools survived the fire.)
Hamilton and other evacuees spent the night at the college, but Hamilton says he couldn't sleep.
"I'm still wired," Hamilton says on Saturday evening.
Hamilton's neighbor, Taylor Ellis, was in Spokane when the fire started. But her mom was at the apartment building and told Ellis that an officer had to kick down the door while evacuating her.
Ellis has three service animals — two cats and a dog. Her mom managed to grab the dog and one of the cats, but her tortoiseshell cat Mandy is missing.
On Saturday morning, Ellis and Hamilton learned that their apartment building had miraculously survived. Some of the neighboring buildings weren't as lucky. Ellis says it's a relief, and she hopes her cat is still somewhere in the building.
TRYING NOT TO REPEAT HISTORY
On Saturday morning, the state Department of Natural Resources reported that at least 185 structures had been destroyed in Medical Lake and at least one person had died, noting that it was unclear whether a medical issue had played a role.
The state agency was on-site at Cheney Middle School helping coordinate information among dozens of fire departments that had arrived from across the region.
Firefighters pitched their tents along the fenced lawns of the school, where support staff had set up shower trailers and portable toilets.
Some firefighters leaned against their rigs Saturday afternoon as they sharpened their axes in preparation for digging fire lines to stave off the Gray Fire's growth. With dense smoke making it difficult for firefighting aircraft to respond, crews focused on the ground.
South of an eerily empty Interstate 90, crews battled flames that licked up the trees where the fire had jumped the freeway near Willow and Granite lakes.
Traffic was detoured, with a closure from Tyler through Geiger that later expanded to Sprague. U.S. Route 2 and Cheney-Spokane Road backed up for miles, as interstate traffic merged with fleeing residents who'd loaded up trailers and truck beds with their possessions.
Still, even as hundreds of firefighters battled the two wind-driven fires in Spokane County, DNR public information officer Eric Keller said he didn't think the situation was looking to be as bad as Firestorm '91, which he was there for.
One of the worst disasters in recent memory, "Firestorm" kicked off on Oct. 16, 1991, destroying 114 homes and killing two. Firefighters faced communications problems as more than 80 fires popped up around Eastern Washington and North Idaho, burning 50,000 acres, according to the Spokesman-Review. Similar to this weekend's fires, high winds and a lack of rain also played a factor that day.
"I would say that you're comparing apples and oranges," Keller said Saturday afternoon. "It's a different time of year, although it was both wind-driven fires. Firestorm was not just in one place, it was here, in the Valley, up north, on the West Plains."
Keller said that Firestorm was a turning point in how fire agencies around the Northwest communicate and work together.
"Firestorm '91 drew everybody together," Keller says. "We work together a lot more. We train together, so that when stuff like this does happen we're able to respond better."
MOBILIZING HELP
Smoke from both fires, and another massive blaze near Kelowna, B.C., drove the air quality index in Spokane County upward, from 150 to 350 to more than 500 on Sunday morning, making it hazardous for anyone to spend time outside.
Spokane directed homeless residents and those who couldn't access clean air to the TRAC shelter on Trent and to city libraries.
Thousands of people who'd evacuated from the fires filled hotel rooms, stayed with family or found shelter at the Red Cross evacuation sites at Spokane Falls Community College and Riverside High School.
The Oregon Fire reportedly burned at least 80 structures and killed one person, according to public safety officials.
The community quickly rallied to help. People offered their trailers and properties to help house horses and other large animals. Donations of food and clothing poured into the Red Cross sites so quickly that by Saturday night, the relief organization posted to social media asking the community to please donate money instead, as they had more physical donations than they had space for.
"We are actively looking for some place to warehouse all this stuff we are getting," Betsy Robertson, communications director for the American Red Cross Northwest Region, said on Sunday evening. "We have folks volunteering to come to the shelter and work, and they're spending all their time going through bags of items. Every single one of those is wrapped up with good intention, but the reality is it's not what we need."
Robertson said the local Red Cross was not yet offering direct financial assistance to fire victims — most hadn't been allowed to go see their properties and learn what their needs were yet — but that work was likely to start this week.
"As we get further into the recovery process, we start talking about financial assistance and more permanent solutions and places to go," Robertson said. "You can give to our general disaster response, and we will do whatever we need to meet the needs of the community."
DEVASTATING LOSS
Catherine Swan lived in a trailer near a boat launch in Medical Lake, and recalls being evacuated by a sheriff's deputy on Friday afternoon.
"The Medical Lake Fire and Rescue, the STA bus system, the school bus system, the police, the sheriffs, the EMTs — all of them worked in harmony," Swan says. "There was nobody panicking, everybody was accommodated."
That evening, Swan and her husband tried driving back into town — they'd heard the property had survived unscathed.
They took Brooks Road south off Route 2, but decided to turn around when they got closer to the town.
"You could just feel the heaviness, and there was this red glow," Swan says. "I've never been that scared before."
The couple made a U-turn and ended up spending the night at the Spokane Falls Community College evacuation site.
Many Medical Lake residents learned what happened to their homes for the first time on Saturday morning. The dawn brought relief for some, and devastation for others.
Daniel Hall, a professional musician who's been performing around Spokane for years, was out of town when the fire started. But on Saturday morning, his niece sent him pictures of his former home on the edge of Silver Lake.
There was nothing left.
Hall's house is rubble. His RV is destroyed. So are the guitars, keyboards and recording equipment that fuel his livelihood.
"I didn't have homeowners insurance, so it's like a total loss for me," Hall says. "I've never experienced anything like this. It's been extremely overwhelming and devastating."
Swan was eating breakfast at Spokane Falls Community College on Saturday morning when her husband came to her in tears. He had just gotten off a video call with his mom, who had somehow managed to return to the property.
"It's all gone, baby," he told her. "It's all gone. Everything."
Swan is devastated. But she also has hope. On Friday, before she knew their trailer had burned down, Swan was walking around the grounds of Medical Lake High School — still soaking wet from spraying the property down and unsure of what would come next — when she found a peach pit on the ground.
"That was my sign to plant and start again," Swan says. "I'm going to go back there, and I'm going to clean it up. And I'm going to get back down to the barest minimum and start all over again. She's gonna come back." ♦
HOW TO HELP
GRAY AND OREGON FIRE RELIEF COMMUNITY HELP
With volunteers staging at the Yoke's grocery store parking lot in Airway Heights, people are working to go into the burned areas to rescue large and small animals. Lauri Cline is helping dispatch volunteers who've got horse trailers and other equipment, and says the group already found places for about 20 to 25 animals as of Monday. Four trucks were dispatched to the Medical Lake area on Monday to keep looking for animals, and the group is helping place animals on volunteers' pasture land as well as coordinating veterinary care as needed. The group says they can help with horses, cows, sheep, goats, dogs, cats and more. Contact them through their Facebook page if you need help or can volunteer.
LITTLE NOODLE AND GARDEN PARTY
In a partnership with Giving Back Spokane (formerly Spokane Quaranteam), Lumberbeard Brewing and YaYa Brewing, Little Noodle and Garden Party will be donating 10 percent of all sales this week and $5 from every draft beer sold at the restaurants. Those who bring canned food donations will get 5 percent off their tab. Little Noodle is located at 713 W. Garland (open Tue-Sun noon to 8:30 pm) and Garden Party is located at 107 S. Madison (open Wed-Sun 11 am to 11 pm).
AMERICAN RED CROSS
redcross.org/local/washington/volunteer
redcross.org/donate
The Northwest Red Cross has asked the community to please hold off on donating more clothing, food or hygiene items. Monetary donations can help get the items that fire victims need most, as well as help them with longer term shelter as they start over.
NO-LI WITH RED CROSS
No-Li Brewhouse is joining with KREM2, Bison Printing, chef Chad White and David's Pizza to raise money for the Red Cross. They hope to raise $50,000 in relief funds for the local Red Cross efforts, and No-Li will match dollar for dollar up to $25,000. Cash or checks made out to Red Cross Northwest can be dropped off at No-Li or David's Pizza.
INNOVIA WILDFIRE EMERGENCY RESPONSE FUND
innovia.org/wildfire-relief
The Wildfire Emergency Response Fund is accepting tax-deductible donations for wildfire relief and recovery efforts throughout the region. Some big local institutions — STCU's Here For Good Foundation, Washington Trust Bank, Premera Blue Cross and Innovia Foundation — seeded the effort with a combined total of $200,000. In an incredible fundraising effort, Rick Clark's Giving Back Spokane worked with KHQ to raise at least $402,000 for the fund.
EAT GOOD GROUP
The Eat Good Group restaurants in Washington and Idaho are accepting donated items and offering 15 percent off tabs in exchange. Participating restaurants include Baba, Yards Bruncheon, de España, Gilded Unicorn, Française, Honey Eatery and Social Club, and Republic Kitchen + Taphouse. People can also purchase a gift card for their own use and the restaurant group will donate one of equal value to someone affected by the fires.
GOFUNDME
The crowdfunding donation site GoFundMe has created a centralized hub where people can find verified fundraisers supporting those who lost their homes in the fires. Find verified campaigns at gofundme.com/c/act/wildfire-relief/washington.
— SAMANTHA WOHLFEIL
