TRUCK FIRE – Firefighters knock down a fire in a Ford Explorer truck in Arrowhead Trailer Park in the 1200 block of Sawmill Creek Road Saturday evening. One person received fire-related injuries and was taken to the hospital, Sitka Fire Department Chief Craig Warren said, and the truck was considered a total loss. The cause of the fire is under investigation, Warren said. The fire hall received the call about the fire at 5:33 p.m., and one fire engine with eight firefighters and an ambulance were dispatched, he said. (Sentinel Photo by James Poulson)
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Daily Sitka Sentinel
Wildfire a Near Miss For Transplanted Sitkan
By SHANNON HAUGLAND
Sentinel Staff Writer
A former Sitka resident now living in Santa Rosa, Calif., said today the wine country wildfire came too close for comfort, but he and his family are alive and well.
Leif Calvin, son of Larry and the late Maryann Calvin, spoke to the Sentinel today, reporting on a night of intense watchfulness and his eventual decision to evacuate as the fire steadily approached his home just south of town.
His timber frame house was spared, and the family was able to move back in by Monday evening. He said a number of his friends have lost their homes and other property.
“We were quite fortunate,” he said. “There’s still ashes and smoke everywhere.”
Calvin said his family hosted a salmon party with about 50 guests Sunday evening. The guests left at 10:30 and he and his wife Tammy Carter were cleaning up at 11:30 p.m. when the lightning strikes hit.
“The wind started blowing really hard, 20 miles an hour, and gusts up to 50 ... blowing from the north,” he said. At 12:30 a.m. they could see the north end of town aglow from the fires. At around 3 a.m. a second fire started to the east of their home. This one was headed toward them.
“By 6 a.m. it was within a mile and a half of us,” he said.
It was time to go.
Leif and Tammy roused their sons, Maxwell, 12, and Gabe, 14, who thought they were being woken up for school. The family loaded up their two horses, dog and cat and drove west toward the ocean. They chose that route because they knew traffic was moving slowly in the other direction as some 120,000 people left their homes on the north side of town.
Leif said it was tough packing up and leaving, aware that his house might not be there when they came back, but it wasn’t a difficult choice.
“The important things were all in the car, with the kids, wife, dogs, horses (in a trailer)... everything else is replaceable, even houses,” he said.
A member of the Sitka High Class of 1986, Calvin brings his family back to Sitka for about a month every year.
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20 YEARS AGO
March 2004
Businesses using the Centennial Hall parking lot testified Tuesday against a proposal to charge them rent in addition to the $200 annual permit fee. City Administrator Hugh Bevan made the proposal in response to the Assembly’s direction to Centennial Hall manager Don Kluting to try to close the $340,000 gap between building revenues and operational costs.
50 YEARS AGO
March 1974
Alaska Native Brotherhood Grand President William S. Paul Sr. will be special guest and speaker at the local ANB, Alaska Native Sisterhood Founders Day program Monday at the ANB Hall.