Pocatello Fire

Last years FIRE was on the other side of the highway, but this years fire was a lot closer.

Jake called me at work around 15.30 on Thursday saying there was a fire up by Grandma and Grandpa Semons' house. The road was closed so he couldn't get up there to see if they were ok.

When I drove home, I saw the fire from the highway and figured there was no way in hell their house was still standing. In the next hour we heard that Grandma and Grandpa were safe, but they were still up by their house. Our next worry was wether or not the fire was going to come our way. We were out watering the lawn and all the trees for hours and hours that afternoon.

66 houses burned to the ground that day,  but the fire stopped about 300 meters from our house thanks to the Mink Creek Road.

Fire seen from our bedroom around 4 o'clock

The wind was blowing towards town for a while

Some trees catching on fire up on the hill

Then the wind started turning towards us. Look at all the smoke! Originally there wasn't a cloud in the sky that day.

Grandma came and brought us some pizza

The wind was definitely picking up our way for a while. 

In case you were wondering; it was HOT outside

At this point it was hard to see which side of the road the fire was on because of all the smoke

It was raining ashes 

The neighbors leaving with their horses.

After that we decided to leave too. Not mainly because of the fire, but mostly because of all the smoke.

In addition the power went out and the fire alarm went off in the house, so it would have been hard to go to sleep anyways.

The next day we went up to Grandma and Grandpa's house to see what it looked like up there.

On the way up we saw a hot-spot flare up. It went from nothing...

...to this:

...to this:

...in about one minute.

Then the helicopter came and dumped some buckets of water on it.

5 out of 6 of Grandma and Grandpa's closest neighbors houses had burned to the ground, but Grandma and Grandpa's house was still standing. The barn behind their house burned down, but they managed to keep the flames away from their house. I can't believe their house is still standing when looking around.

What's left of the barn

View from their yard

Their driveway

The flames sure tried to sneak in to their yard!

Their neighbor's house.

It's extremely sad to see all the burned houses, I feel so sad for the people who lost their homes.

I also feel bad for the people that weren't home and couldn't get home to save their pets. We had a couple come up our driveway totally devastated because the road was closed and their two dogs were in the house. I hope they made it.

HERE is a little news clip from the local news. If you click on the video to the right, you might see someone you know!