‘Come and get me,’ boy pleaded before California fire death
REDDING: A young boy pleaded for rescue before he died along with two others in a California wildfire, an anguished relative recounted on Monday, while other shaken survivors told of their flight from a “tornado” of fire.
The worst blaze, in the US state’s north, has killed six people since Thursday, including a 70-yearold woman and her two greatgrandchildren aged four and five.
They perished when flames swallowed their home in Redding.
Local media identified the victims as Melody Bledsoe and the children, Emily Roberts and James Roberts, nicknamed “Junior.”
“I talked to Junior on the phone till he died,” Melody’s husband Ed Bledsoe told CNN, recounting the last words of the boy, his sister, and Bledsoe’s wife.
“He said ‘Come and get me, the fire’s comin’ in the back door. Come on grandpa,’ Bledsoe said, his voice choking.
All three told them that they loved him, before Bledsoe assured the boy: “I’m on my way.”
He couldn’t get there in time to save them.
The “Carr Fire” around Redding is the worst of several large-scale blazes that have turned close to 200,000 acres into ashen wasteland.
“I’ve been a lifelong resident of this community, and I’ve never seen a fire with such destruction here in this area ever before,” Shasta County Supervisor Leonard Moty said of the Carr Fire.
Alyce Macken said she had only minutes to flee with her husband Ted from the flames sweeping closer to her home in Redding.
“At six o’clock in the morning there was a knock on the door, a pounding, and it was the sheriff telling us that we had 15 minutes to get out,” Macken said.
“We were out in 10 minutes. I was shaking, it just went by really fast.”
Macken, who is retired, said that she met other panic-stricken neighbours at a nearby shopping centre — and watched from afar as her home went up in flames.
“It was almost like a tornado with fire in it and it came over the hill and it wiped out our house, it wiped out our next door neighbour’s home,” she said.
About 38,000 people have been evacuated in Shasta County due to the Carr Fire, officials said.
US President Donald Trump on the weekend approved California’s request for federal help to fight the blaze and assist evacuees.
A thick smoke haze covered a large part of northern California, severely limiting visibility and contributing to breathing problems.
According to the California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services (Cal OES), 12,000 firefighters from as far away as Florida and New Jersey have deployed across the state.
A firefighter identified as Brian Hughes died on Sunday while battling the Ferguson Fire near Yosemite National Park, a major tourist attraction partially closed because of the fire.
Hughes “was struck and killed by a tree” while fighting the blaze, the Sequoia and Kings National Parks Service said.
The remains of a person who ignored Carr Fire evacuation orders was found in a burned-out residence on Sunday, said Shasta County Sheriff Tom Bosenko.
Two firefighters were killed late last week battling the Carr blaze, and another firefighter died days earlier working at the fire around Yosemite.
Seven other people are reported missing, Sheriff Bosenko said, adding that 600 National Guard soldiers had been deployed for support duties such as roadblocks.
Redding Police Chief Roger Moore warned that looting has become a problem since evacuations began.
Two people, a man and a women, have been arrested on suspicion of stealing from evacuated homes in Redding.