Sunday 24 Aug

Suz was obsessively peeking at a camera around 5Am when the power went off again. So disturbing. We spent time updating people - the interest and supportive responses from friends, family and the central Oregon community has been astonishing. Suz and I are both very humbled by all the people who have reached out and offered housing storage and help of any kind night or day. We decided to do some therapy shopping in Bend. We ended up eating lunch in Sisters and eventually decided to see if we could get up to the house to get a few more things, reposition and add solar charging to cameras, and do a bit more defensible space adjustment.

Suz wrote a very nice update for today:

It’s been a roller coaster! we thought we were in the clear from the fire raging down the canyon on the other side of our street.. But there was southerly progress of the fire on the west side of our property. We had a scare at about 5:30 am when the power went off again which could potentially mean the house is gone, but it came on a couple hours later
We made the decision to try and get to the house to see if we could get more stuff as well as my car… we were let through the road block (with ID required). Our street was surreal with air retardant dropped on some of the houses and a few small spots that burned but so far no homes lost. Whew! We still have danger from the west - there is so much activity down there - helicopters, planes and a constant flow of fire vehicles.. lots of embers on and around the house

We took the time to do a bit more defensible space protection like moving all the plastic stuff, chairs etc away from the house. We also attached solar chargers to the security cams so they won’t
Lose charge. Now as long as we have power we can monitor the house on cameras. We got a few more valuables like uncle Bill’s guitar and some of my grandfathers original artwork.
We are feeling better about things now that we’ve been able to check things out but today is a pivotal day and I feel like it could go either way.

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The first video below shows a helicopter from our back yard - which is comforting and terrifying at the same time. The second video shows some fire crew activity at the confluence of Mountain View and Buffalo.