The private Facebook group has added more than 500 new members since the fire ignited and has become even more of a hub for sharing information, support and grief while evacuated.įoster, an area CERT founder, has seen the damage firsthand as he works to feed and rescue animals and pets from behind the roadblocks.

“The impacts are devastating, and my heart hurts for all those that are actually finally getting pictures of their homes that are lost,” said Kevin Foster, a pillar of the Boulder Creek community and founder of its most popular social media group, Boulder Creek Neighbors. Dozens of homes in the town’s outskirts, and to its north and west, were destroyed. Its downtown stands unharmed thanks to the concentrated effort of Cal Fire crews that worked around the clock to keep flames from overrunning the string of San Lorenzo Valley communities. “The saying goes, ‘We’re all here because we’re not all there.’ Everyone in Boulder Creek was a little different.”Ī former lumber town, Boulder Creek is home to nearly 5,000. “It was a place that really gave refuge to all kinds of people,” Burgess said, worrying that not everyone in the community will be able to afford to recover and rebuild.

But days after the first damage map was released, many of the town’s residents have already begun the long process of assessing what was lost, and what remains. Many fire-scorched areas remained evacuated Saturday as the fire still burns and fallen trees, downed power lines and damaged roadways create persistent threats. Some rural neighborhoods were left decimated, while in others many homes still stand, some with yards entirely unblemished - islands of green amid oceans of black. The brick and stone chimney, metal railings and the cement slab are all that remain of park headquarters after the CZU August Lightning Complex ravaged Big Basin Redwoods State Park. 16 burned down the North Coast and swept across the southern reaches of San Mateo County, through Big Basin State Park, across wide swathes of Bonny Doon and well into the outskirts of Boulder Creek.įlames torched more than 83,000 acres and 899 structures, and counting, including Big Basin’s headquarters. Flames from more than 20 fires sparked by lightning Aug. It amounts to a loss without any precedent for the region since the Loma Prieta Earthquake in 1989. They’re a part of who we are because they’re all so unique, and everybody puts their own stamp on their house.”Įach of their homes now sits as a pile of ash and debris, consumed by the flames of the CZU August Lightning Complex fire along with more than 600 others, almost all of which stood in rural areas of Santa Cruz County. “A lot of the houses are not cookie cutter,” said Wilson, 37.

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