The majority of the Level 3 Evacuation Orders in and around Spokane were rolled back Sunday as crews reported significant progress fighting the area’s wildfires. Thousands are allowed to return home for the first time since the complex fire started. Many of them found their homes and possessions were destroyed.
The scale of the destruction was massive. In a subdivision near Riverside State Park, nearly every home was leveled.
“This entire neighborhood was gone,” Sarah Bird, who lost her home to the fire, said. “And it was in like five minutes. It was just gone.”
All the houses on Bird’s street were decimated. The burnt-out shells of cars and appliances remained standing. Everything was covered in white ash.
“Everything we have worked hard for is gone,” she said.
Before people returned, crews placed plastic tubs in each driveway, packed with Tyvek suits, masks, gloves and other protective gear so people could begin searching the rubble and picking up the pieces.
Officials warned that the ashes that used to be their homes are carcinogenic and urged caution to those who intend to search through the rubble.
“I mean, look around,” Bird said. “This isn’t someplace anyone should be unless they have to be.”
Bird told KIRO 7 she gave her children minutes to gather up their belongings. By the time they pulled out of their driveway, she could see the flames moving through the state park, where she and her family spent countless hours walking and biking. Sitting in the hours-long evacuation traffic, she knew her home was gone.
“You could see that the entire neighborhood was on fire,” she said. “At one point, as we were sitting in traffic, we thought, ‘Do we run for the river if the fire hits the car?’”
Many of the items lost can be replaced. Homes can be rebuilt. That’s what insurance is for.
A disaster assistance center has been set up at Shadle Park High School, where officials report thousands of people have been served so far.
KIRO 7 spoke to Suzanne and Gary Jespersen while they worked their way through the center, figuring out how to replace important documents and begin the years-long process of rebuilding.
They made it out of their home safely with their beloved dog, but now back in their neighborhood, they are coming to terms with what they have lost.
“Heirlooms from family members. Pictures,” Suzanne told KIRO 7 are just some of the things they will miss forever.
I had a tablecloth from my Danish grandmother. She made it when she was fourteen,” Gary added, choking up.
Bird worries she lost a community she loved. Her neighborhood was full of families with teen children who hung out together. She’s made short-term accommodations, but doesn’t know where she and her family will end up in the years to come, let alone the countless neighbors she adored.
“It will never be the same,” she said.
Sometimes, though, miracles happen in the ashes.
“As I was digging through the rubble, I came across my son’s very first baby ornament,” a man who asked not to be identified by name told KIRO 7. “A porcelain shoe that made it out, more or less unscathed.”
The tiny shoe was scorched on one side but still had his son’s name written on the sole. It was buried in his basement under feet of debris.
“I uncovered that, and it was just like the light came out of the ashes right there,” he said. “How something so simple, so delicate, could come out relatively unharmed.”
Officials said they intend to roll back the remaining evacuation areas in the coming days so everyone affected can begin the long road to recovery.
“Watch out for the glass, watch out for the nails,” the man said. “They are everywhere, but sometimes you can find little treasures.”
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