On June 11, a wildfire quickly spread to the town of Rowena, Oregon in the Columbia River Gorge. The wind-whipped flames forced Level 3 (Go Now) evacuations for over 2,000 people. The Red Cross was asked by the county emergency manager to open a shelter at The Dalles Middle School and volunteers got to work, moving a supply trailer to the site, setting up cots, and ordering food for those who would come in.
Forty-five people stayed at the shelter the first night. Some had no idea if their homes were still standing, like Kristi Boyd who escaped her mobile home park with her cat, “Alice.”
“My neighbor knocked on the door and said we need to go. I’m glad he did because we had no idea it was happening,” she says.”
Others, like Donald Armstrong, knew his house was gone. He saw it.
“It was weird, the fire took out every other house, and our house was just the one that got taken out. Burnt to the ground.”
The fire destroyed his home, his boats, and all his fishing gear. This was the second time he had lost a home due to wildfire.
“We’ve lost everything. This is what we got, the clothes on my back. My fiancé lost her phone, her birth certificate. I lost my papers from the V-A,” says Armstrong.
He stopped by the shelter to see how he could connect to services. Then, he was on his way to stay with his mom in Yakima and figure out his next steps.
On June 12th, day two of the shelter operation, people came trickling in all day saying things like:
“I just lost my house.“
“Well, my house is gone.”
“I’m not sure how this works, what am I supposed to do?”
But there were also people coming in, every single hour, saying things like:
“How can I help?
“What do you need?”
“My house is okay, but I want to help the people who are here.“
That is the emotional rollercoaster of a shelter. The pain that comes from people who’ve lost everything and the hope that there are so many people who want to help. Alicia Mitchell was inspired to help. She signed up to be a Red Cross volunteer and came to the shelter to post brochures directing people to partner services.
Mitchell says, “I came because I overheard a lady who had just lost her house, and it really hit home to me. So, I thought ‘what can I do to help?'”
Red Cross volunteers are staffing the shelter 24/7 and will remain there until evacuation notices are lifted and people have a place to go.
They’ll do it over and over this wildfire season and when you thank them for their work, they’ll just say, “It’s what we do.”
If you want to stay on top of wildfire danger, find shelter locations, or get wildfire preparedness tips, download the free Red Cross Emergency App. The fire season has just begun and the time to get prepared is now.
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