Thank you Maria and everyone
we are home. I don't think there is any imminent danger to the town of Santa Rosa any more but the air quality is still bad and the fires are still burning in the hills. There are still some areas in Santa Rosa under mandatory evacuation and those areas are blocked off by police and military. We sent our youngest daughter to stay with family in San Diego because she has issues already with her lungs so we didn't want her breathing this air 24/7.
A lot of people we know lost their homes and some lost their jobs. I drove the I5 south to Los Angeles last week and there was haze from the fires all the way to the Grapevine pass where you get into the mountains north of L.A. On the way back was similar. Haze as far as you could see on the horizon. If you are not familiar with California to put that in perspective, that would be like seeing smoke in the sky in Philadelphia from fires in Maine. When we took the 80 east to Sacramento last week you could see the fires in the hills in Napa from the interstate and it was tough to breath driving through Fairfield and Vacaville. The oncoming headlights were sick yellow instead of white.
There are hundreds of fire trucks, military vehicles of different shapes and sizes, ambulances and red cross vehicles in Santa Rosa right now. A lot of people are still displaced but there are a lot of volunteers and supplies helping people. The parking lots at the fair grounds are full where people are receiving shelter and service for themselves and animals. Otherwise people are going about their business. Many wearing masks. Some people even walking around smoking cigarettes.
