USA TODAY US Edition

A WARNING ‘LIKE PAUL REVERE’

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The last thing Wilhelmina Grader grabbed from her home was a pair of rubber gloves.

“My daughter and I are germaphobe­s,” she said. “I couldn’t help it.”

In the panic of gathering her family, five cats, fish and gecko in the earlymorni­ng hours Wednesday, she said the rubber gloves were a frantic grab — one piece of comfort she could hold on to.

At 2:30 a.m., Grader, 53, was startled awake by someone “honking their horn like Paul Revere warning everyone” on Chablis North in Calistoga, Calif. A few minutes later, frightened neighbors started knocking on the door of Grader’s home, which she shares with her mother, stepfather and daughter.

Grader said the knocks and honking woke her. She knew it was time to leave.

The three generation­s fled to the evacuation center at the Napa Valley College.

“Are we doing OK?” she asked, tears welling in her eyes as she clutched her knitted brown sweater closer to her body. “No, no we’re not.

“But we’re all here. We’re all alive.”

 ?? JASON BEAN ?? Wilhelmina Grader fled with her family, five cats, a gecko — and, in her panic, a pair of rubber gloves.
JASON BEAN Wilhelmina Grader fled with her family, five cats, a gecko — and, in her panic, a pair of rubber gloves.

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