‘This is a pretty dangerous fire’
Sterling Folden, the deputy chief with Mountain View Fire Rescue, was unable to see past the hood of his car when he first arrived in Marshall on the morning of the fire. Soon after, he drove up a hill to a nearby home and asked the residents to evacuate.
“I started to turn my vehicle around to get out, and the fire was at the house,” Folden said.
The smoke was so thick that Folden decided to shelter in place, unsure he would be able to navigate the switchbacks down the hill. The fast-moving fire came over his GMC Yukon, melting his grill, emergency lights and breaking his windows.
“So that was a point where I thought, ‘Hmm, this is a pretty dangerous fire,’” Folden said.
Thousands of emergency personnel worked the Marshall Fire. Fire hydrants failed in some neighborhoods and propane tanks exploded. An analysis of the response that day compared the area to a war zone.
The numbers attached to the disaster are staggering: 37,000 residents evacuated. More than 1,000 homes burned down. All of this has weighed heavily on first responders — they’re carrying around baggage, as Folden puts it.
One-third of Mountain View Fire Rescue’s 150 firefighters responded to the disaster. Since then, some of them have needed time off. Some have sought mental health help, including Folden. He says that demand for the department’s peer support program has increased this year.
“There were still a couple of lives lost, which is terrible. There were a lot of homes lost and a lot of people's memories and personal items. And I think that a lot of us take that personally and hold ourselves responsible,” Folden said. “And I think that's still true a year later. It is for me anyway.”
Last week, Mountain View Fire Rescue responded to another blaze on a dry, windy day west of Boulder. The Sunshine Wildland Fire forced evacuation orders on nearly 1,000 residents and burned down one home. That day, Folden said he was preparing for a Marshall Fire repeat but hoping that wouldn’t happen.
‘The neighbors are really amazing. These people are like family’
One year after Kaz Jaszczak’s home in Superior burned to the ground, he now has a big decision to make: to rebuild or buy elsewhere.
“Well, you know, people are telling me, ‘You are too old for rebuilding the house’,” Jaszczak said with a laugh. “The second thing, you know, what do you need this house for?”
Jaszczak is 72. He came to the US from Poland in the 80s for work. He and his family moved into the house in Superior in 1996. They were the first and only owners.
“So I’m kind of riding two horses at the same time, still not being sure which way I will go,” Jaszczak said.
Rebuilding would not be easy. Like so many others, Jaszczak is underinsured and would have to kick in his own money to make it work. But he loves his neighborhood; his house was near a greenbelt with sports fields nearby and mountain views. Since the fire, Jasszczak’s neighbors have housed him and given him basement storage for his belongings.
“The neighbors are really amazing. These people are like family,” Jaszczak said.
He misses the atmosphere of his home and the memories made over the year. Jaszczak remembers Christmas celebrations. His family would hang fresh spruce branches from the ceiling and sit down to a big dinner of 12 Polish dishes like marinated herring and cabbage-filled dumplings.
“It was repeated every year. And so this was something which definitely I treasure a lot,” Jaszczak said.
His two daughters grew up in the house. His wife, who died from cancer ten years ago, passed away in the house. At that time, a family of owls were nesting in the cottonwood trees behind their house.
“She obviously realized that she would pass away soon,” Jaszczak said. “ And she told me, okay. I will be visiting you. And I will be coming as one of these owls.”
All of these years later, after the fire, Jaszczak was sorting through some debris on his property.
“I was using my hammer and making some noise and all of the sudden, an owl flew out of this debris,” Jaszczak. “And I saw her. It was her.”
Jaszczak is in Poland right now with his daughter, taking some time to think about the future. He is giving himself a deadline of January to make the big decision: to rebuild or buy elsewhere.
‘The next windstorm really will blow us all away’
On the morning of December 30th, as westerly winds raced over the foothills near Boulder, Susan Gibson, president of the resident’s co-op at Table Mesa Village, watched pieces of metal, windows and chunks of roofs fly down her street.
“That windstorm was so extreme, it started tearing my whole pergola apart. And so I just grabbed my cordless drill and went out and started, like, reinforcing it,” Gibson said.
Gibson had packed up her valuables: computers, old photos, her birth certificate. Her cats were in carriers, ready to be evacuated.
“That's some intense anxiety when you can see the fire,” Gibson said.
At least 450 mobile homes in Boulder County were damaged by the high winds that day. Roofs, siding, windows and doors were blown off and smashed. In the freezing days that followed, pipes burst.
Gibson had ripped her kitchen sink out for renovations a while back so when the pipes froze under her bathroom sink, she was down to only one working water source.
“So the only running water I have now is in my shower, Gibson said. “That's where I do my dishes. That is really the only damage I personally had.”
Table Mesa Village, a small community of 50 homes near Boulder, is tidy. Much of the mess has been cleaned up and many repairs have been done. Gibson points to things that blew away and haven yet to be replaced: a carport, siding and a swamp cooler.
Mobile home communities tend to be more vulnerable to natural disasters like windstorms and slower to recover from them. Over this past year, some money has been available to residents through local donations, as well as through the state and federal government.
An effort is underway by the city and county of Boulder to get more of the repair work done. Assessors are going to mobile home parks to check out the damage and to look for possible energy and water efficiency upgrades. The local governments are buying materials and finding volunteers to do the work for free.
“So over the years, I've experienced a lot of really terrifying windstorms. However, that storm on the 30th was obviously way worse than anything I've ever experienced,” Gibson said.
Gibson is worried about climate change but has no plans to move. She loves her house and her garden and has put a tremendous amount of work into both over the years.
“Where can we go from here?” she wonders. “You know, the next windstorm really will blow us all away or burn us all down.”
