"An angel in the right spot," friend says of firefighter who rescued woman from wildfire flames
When the Airport Fire spread into Riverside County, Dean James and his friend, Jackie Hunter, tried to escape the flames moving closer toward their home in Lake Elsinore. They had their car all packed and ready to go. Then, it wouldn't start.
Hunter panicked and ran off as she feared for her life. James later saw her surrounded by smoke and flames in the massive wildfire, which has now burned more than 23,000 acres and destroyed 82 homes as firefighting crews work around the clock.
"She was walking through hell, and I was at the gate looking and I couldn't see her," James said.
Video shows her walking just feet away from bright red, roaring flames as embers fly around on the ground below her. A patrol vehicle with flashing lights pulls up just as some towering flames in the background grow taller, winds sweeping them upwards.
Cal Fire Riverside Battalion Chief Mark Martinez tried to reassure her as she got in.
"She was screaming in pain and wanted help," Martinez said. "And I told her I'm gonna get her help. We're gonna get off the hill."
James said he's just thankful the firefighter was there. Hunter is one of 14 people wounded in the Airport Fire including a dozen firefighters, according to the latest count issued Saturday by Cal Fire, or the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.
"She's alive," James said. "God put an angel in the right spot."
Since then, Hunter has been hospitalized for burn injuries and is being treated in the intensive care unit of Arrowhead Regional Medical Center in Colton.
"I was just glad that I saw her alive because I didn't know what happened — whether she turned the wrong way and walked into the fire or went back to the house for some reason and got trapped," said Reed Nichols, her friend and landlord.
It's not clear what her current condition is as of Saturday.
James was also rescued from the blaze along with his dog, Zeus, but now has "nowhere to go," he said.
His home and three others owned by Nichols in the El Cariso neighborhood of Lake Elsinore have all been completely destroyed by the wildfire. More than 80 homes there and in other areas including nearby Lakeland Village were lost in the fire.
It's one of three blazes tearing through the Southern California region, sending thousands of residents fleeing from their homes as they exploded in size over the past week. One of the other wildfires, the Bridge Fire in Los Angeles and San Bernardino counties, is currently the third-largest fire in California so far this year after it scorched more than 53,000 acres, or about 83 square miles.
Altogether, the three wildfires have burned more than 100,000 acres.