By QUINTON SMITH/YachatsNews.com
Tracy Cahn’s daughter is in second grade and looking forward to her first ukulele lesson. Cahn’s son graduated from high school in June, despite living 450 miles away, and is looking for a trade apprenticeship.
But a year after fleeing the Camp Fire inferno in Paradise, Calif. that incinerated her home and photography studio, Cahn, 45, is still putting together pieces of her life from her new home in Yachats.
“I count my blessings,” Cahn said this week on the first anniversary of the fire — and as other raging wildfires died down — that destroyed the city of 27,000 east of Chico, Calif. and killed 86 people, including one of Cahn’s aunts. “I’m glad I’m here and not there.”
Cahn was born and raised in Paradise. For 45 years she was surrounded by parents, step-parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins. She had a photography business and studio downtown.
That changed starting about 6:30 a.m. Nov. 8, 2018.
A downed Pacific Gas & Electric power line in a neighboring community sparked the blaze. Pushed by big winds, it exploded through tinder-dry brush and forests toward Paradise. Some 90 minutes after its start, a cousin called Cahn worrying that falling embers would set their neighborhood ablaze.
Her son, Carson, and daughter, Grace, were still home. They grabbed belongings, called her mother, and headed toward nearby Chico.
Westbound traffic on the main two-lane road out of town was light; but the other lane was filled with parents racing back from jobs in Chico to grab kids from school or daycare.
Most of her extended family lost their homes that day, escaping ahead of the flames that burned through 18,800 homes, businesses, schools and almost everything else in Paradise in four hours.
In all, the Camp Fire covered 153,000 acres, caused $16.5 billion in damage and became the sixth deadliest wildfire in U.S. history.
The immediate aftermath
During the next few months Cahn and her children moved between a cousin’s house in Oroville, RVs set up inside a warehouse, and their vacation rental in Yachats. Other relatives scattered to motels and RV parks.
Only after a month did Butte County sheriff’s deputies escort Cahn back to her property to look for valuables or keepsakes. She was able to scavenge a box of singed photos, her wedding ring and other jewelry, and a glass sea star given to her by the Yachats Visitor Center for winning a postcard photography contest.
The tragedy of the fire only worsened an already complicated financial situation.
Tracy Cahn and her husband, Jeffrey Cahn, divorced in early 2017. Fourteen months before the fire he was struck and killed by a car while standing along a highway near Chico. His death put their California and Oregon properties into probate – before the Paradise property was wiped out. Tracy Cahn has attorneys in both states working through that process.
They co-owned a vacation rental on King Street in Yachats, where Cahn now lives. Their Paradise house was insured, but proceeds are in probate in California. The insurance company replaced her photography equipment, but is balking at paying for the interruption of her business.
Cahn spent last December and January navigating federal, state and county disaster relief programs. Carson Cahn arranged to finish his senior year living in Yachats and mailing schoolwork back to teachers at Paradise High School every two weeks.
Cahn homeschooled Grace last winter and spring; now she’s attending Crestview Heights School in Waldport.
They returned to Paradise in June when Carson walked in the high school’s graduation ceremony held on the high school football field.
“That was a huge accomplishment,” Tracy Cahn says. “It was very cool. There were lots of tears.”
Now and the future
What’s left of Paradise remains mostly a ghost town. Debris from burned structures has mostly been removed. Taking down burned and dead trees are next. A few houses are being rebuilt.
Speculators are buying up cleared lots. After settling one insurance claim Cahn sold the lot where she lived for $15,000.
Most former residents have scattered across the country. News reports say the town’s population is now about 2,000. A website run by survivors shows locations where residents have landed.
There are now cousins in Tillamook and Brookings. Her mother-in-law moved to Bend.
“I have one uncle whose house didn’t burn, so he stayed,” Cahn says. “But he’s lonely; there’s no one else there.”
Three month’s ago, Cahn’s mother, Debbie, and stepfather moved to Siletz. Her mother used to help with Grace’s transportation to or from school and by cooking dinners, especially when Cahn was working. Now, they spend Fridays and Saturdays together.
“They moved here to be closer to us,” Cahn says. “But we’re still 45 minutes apart, so it’s harder.”
Cahn is a member of the Jehovah Witness church, which has a very active and organized worldwide disaster relief arm for its members. The church helped Cahn’s family in California and members from its Newport church helped her set up house in Yachats when she moved.
This summer a large crew of church members from across Oregon spent two weeks working on Cahn’s house, using donated funds to replace the water heater and furnace, repair and paint siding, replace decks and helped create a photo studio in the basement.
“It’s an amazing group to be with,” she says.
Cahn is getting the word out about her business, Silver Sands Photography, that specializes in weddings and family portraits. She even returned to Chico this summer to photograph a wedding originally scheduled in Paradise.
“I’m trying to make it work,” she said. “I’m figuring out what I can do.”
But Cahn also knows she is fortunate. She has her Yachats house. Grace is doing well “and is well loved.” When she starts feeling sorry for herself she thinks of the mothers fleeing famine or war zones.
“There are mothers somewhere riding in the backs of trucks with their families escaping to who knows what,” Cahn says. “I’m so thankful for what I have here. I count my blessings.”
Other articles about the Camp Fire, Paradise, Calif. and survivors:
From YachatsNews.com in January: Tracy Cahn
From the New York Times: What we learned this year
From Vox: A year later
From Men’s Health magazine: Survivor resilience
From the Wall Street Journal: Finding a home