The Day After the Glass Fire Started
The Glass fire burns on Glass Mountain in Saint Helena. I spent 15 hours inside the Glass fire’s range the day after it started. Here is what I saw.
The Glass Fire started as a cluster of smaller fires…
On Sunday, Sept. 27, 2020, winds rose in the Napa Valley. That morning in Napa and Sonoma counties, the Shady and Boysen fires roared. That night, the fires combined and, at the same time in Saint Helena, the Glass Fire was ignited on Glass Mountain.
Gusty winds increased and so did the fire. The Shady fire portion was headed West towards Santa Rosa.
By Monday morning, the fire had burned 11,000 acres and was still 0% contained.
MONDAY SEPT. 28, 2020.
12:00PM Santa Rosa, Calif. South San Francisco Department Firefighters switch rotations at Skyhawk Park. The house in the lot behind them completely burned down.
1:00PM Santa Rosa, Calif. Firefighters take a short rest. They arrived on the scene at 7 PM last night, and this type of break is the only one they get. “The ground is our bed,” said one of them.
2:00PM Santa Rosa, Calif. South San Francisco Department firefighters Gale Dietrich, left, and Joe Higgins work to put the fire out in a home.
3:00PM Santa Rosa, Calif. The remains of a house on Mountain Hawk Drive in the Glass Fire aftermath in Santa Rosa, Calif.
3:30PM Oakmont Village, Calif. A house on Meadowstone Drive off of Sonoma Highway still smokes after the Glass Fire came through.
4:00PM Sonoma County, Calif. The remains of a home.
6:00PM Calistoga, Calif. The front yard of a home burns off of Highway 128.
7:00PM Calistoga, Calif. Brooks Corrigan, from Brooklyn, NY, throws water on a structure in the property next to his father’s home in Calistoga, Calif. The family tried to keep as many fires off of neighboring structures as possible.
9:00PM Calistoga, Calf. I got a lift up to this property by the owner, who wished to remain unidentified, while his driveway, and later his house, burned.
11:00PM Napa, Calif. Sarah Covert-Flory, left, receives a phone call getting a hotel room while her son, JJ Sbrega, 8, talks about his hamster, Marshmallow, in the parking lot of an emergency evacuation center set up at CrossWalk Community Church. Covert-Flory and her son are from Angwin. When the internet went out, they decided to evacuate.
TUESDAY SEPT. 29, 2020.
12:30AM Calistoga, Calif. A home burns on Silverado Trail in the aftermath of the Glass Fire. The structure caught quickly during the night.
1:00AM Calistoga, Calif. Two firefighters are illuminated by the hot flames of a structure that caught fire on Silverado Trail. The structure was fully engulfed by the Glass Fire by the time crews arrived, so they monitored the scene to make sure nothing else caught fire.
Tuesday Morning at 9:30AM CAL FIRE released a statement that the Glass Fire burned 42,560 acres and was still 0% contained.
At that time, 80 residences had been destroyed.
As of Oct. 5, 2020, the fire has burned 66,840 acres and is 40% contained. At least 487 single homes have been destroyed.
The fire still burns.