I've Never Seen Anything Like It

Last night at 8:50 pm, David called another Food Bank employee, Lu Lu, to figure out a plan to get supplies out to folks. (David is the manager of the Food Bank's Alpine location.) Lu Lu said that the Forest Service's coordinator happened to be on air at Marfa Public Radio (live broadcast and updates at www.marfapublicradio.org) at the time, and told David to call the station. He did. They instructed David to deliver supplies to the Fort Davis Fire Department via Marfa since the road between Alpine and Fort Davis was closed due to the wildfire and downed power lines. We were hopeful that the firefighters and other workers could use the supplies. David immediately called Porter's on 5th Street/Sul Ross in Alpine, and they generously donated 15 cases of bottled water and 19 bags of ice. By then (9 pm), the store was closed, but the nighttime manager and an employee agreed to wait for us. We left our RV and as we drove over Big Hill, we saw the scope of the fire. I told David that the view of the fire made me want to cry, but I didn’t. We got to Porters at about 9:25 pm.

We then went to the Food Bank. David loaded the big truck with supplies (pallets of MREs, pallets of snacks and crackers, and the donations from Porters). We finally left Alpine at about 10:40 pm, heading to Fort Davis via Marfa. We stopped at Marfa Public Radio at about 11:30 pm, where we were welcomed with open arms and offers of coffee and snacks. Marfa Public Radio was already broadcasting via web only since their tower was affected by the widespread power outage.

We left Marfa Public Radio and headed toward Fort Davis on closed Highway 17. We reached the Border Patrol's temporary barrier just outside Marfa. The Forest Service coordinator had promised we could pass the barrier, and true, Border Patrol allowed us to go through with strict instructions to drive slow to avoid livestock on the road, and to turn back if necessary. (We never saw a live animal during our trip.)

Scanning the pitch black openness, looking around the horizon, revealed an apocalyptic ring of fire. The fire ran up the mountains and across every visible area. Everywhere. Wood fenceposts along the roadway burned like matchsticks. We passed firefighters and stopped to offer supplies. We passed AEP's workers setting new utility poles with fire burning all around. We passed one of the Village Farms locations, which appeared to be intact. Along the way, we saw charred black landscape along the roadway. At one point, we crawled past an eerie sight: the shadowed outline of a tree, the tree standing alone with the glowing fire in the background, and nothing but black charred ground all around it. How the tree survived illustrates the mystery of a wildfire to me.

We entered Fort Davis from the west amid the smoke. We strained hard to see if we could make out houses or buildings, but on that side of Fort Davis, it was too dark to see anything. And it was very smokey. In the distance, we saw what we thought was Fort Davis Estates burning, but judging distance was difficult. We later figured out it was actually the area east of Fort Davis Estates, and that the fire had already passed through Fort Davis Estates. We saw faint outlines of a couple of houses, but could not determine if others had burned down. A friend/co-worker lives in Fort Davis Estates. We saw the outline of a two-story house, eerily lit by its solar garden lights.

We approached the Fort Davis Fire Station with caution as it was crawling with tanker trucks, small water trucks, utility trucks, DPS and Border Patrol cars and pickups, and people. The fire station was a sentinel, the only man-made light around. Somebody from the station directed us around to the east side of the building. David backed the truck in and within minutes and with lots of help, what had taken us an hour to load on our own earlier was neatly stacked and ready to distribute. There was little time for hugs and inquiries because a fire truck that was blocked by the big Food Bank truck needed to get out, so we quickly left, but not before I asked one woman about her own home. She said she lives in an adobe home built in 1917 about a mile and half northeast of Fort Davis, and that she had tried to check on it earlier, but the fire kept her away. She did not know the fate of her home. We agreed together to believe that since the home had survived many events since 1917, it surely remained untouched by the fire. I truly hope that is true.

We left the fire station, departing Fort Davis on Highway 17. At the last minute, we decided to head south on Highway 118 toward Alpine via the direct route rather than traveling the long way through Marfa. In agreement that we would turn back if necessary, we drove cautiously through the fire, smoke, and embers past Fort Davis Estates (where our friend’s home hopefully stands), the Davis Mountains Education Center, the cutoff to Dolores Mountain, High Frontier, and the Chihuahuan Desert Nature Center, plus many other landmarks. The fire surrounded the road on both sides. Fence posts and utility poles, broken and bent over like fallen trees, burned. We finally emerged where the only remnant of fire we could see was gray ash on the roadway, until we came out of the Davis Mountains and saw the other wildfire that started near Sul Ross’s Range and Animal Science building burning east of Alpine. We got home at about 2:30 AM.

We learned today that because of a shift in wind direction, the Alpine fire burned westward and crossed over 118, once again threatening Alpine. We visited the Alpine Fire Department today to see what we could do, but volunteer firefighter Oscar Rodriguez reported that people had been bringing bottled water and sandwiches through Saturday night and Sunday morning, so they are set for now. We heard reports that some of the historic buildings in downtown Fort Davis burned, but have no confirmation. (Rumors run rampant and we await confirmation.) We heard that the Hotel Limpia was saved. We heard that herds of aoudad and other wild animal could not outrun the fire. We heard that firefighters cut fences to allow cattle to escape. We heard that the livestock toll is huge and will likely never be accurately counted. We heard that a rancher was forced to shoot his horses because they were on fire. This last report was too much. I cried.

The most recent update (Sunday at 5:02 pm) said that Highway 67 to Fort Stockton is now closed and that traffic is backed up. The Marfa airport is being threatened again. The Alpine fire is still out of control. Power will not be restored to Fort Davis and surrounding area for days. The owner of Murphy’s Pizza in Fort Davis asked for generators so their food could be saved from spoilage.The American Red Cross and Salvation Army are in the area with supplies. The American Red Cross is not accepting donations until tomorrow (Monday).

Kudos to Tom Michael, station manager at Marfa Public Radio (http://www.marfapublicradio.org/), and others at the station for reporting updates through the night and into today. Kudos also to the Big Bend Sentinel (newspaper, www.bigbendnow.com) for providing online updates. The local Alpine station (KVLF on FM and KALP on AM; http://www.bigbendradio.com/) quit providing information last night and at noon today, the website's last report was old - from 6pm yesterday.