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CONCOW, Calif. -- More stories are beginning to emerge from the Camp Fire, and perhaps the earliest glimpse of the disaster was shot by a lifelong resident from Concow, who captured video of the flames and the high winds that fueled them.
Derek Rickmers told ABC10 he received a text message from a friend with the Concow Fire Department around 6:30 a.m. regarding a “brush fire” in his area.
Rickmers raced to his 4-wheeler and up Concow Road to check if he could see anything. He stopped to record video about a mile away from his home, on a gravel path near Andy Mountain Road. There he saw flames tearing through the pines. And it wasn’t the first time Rickmers had to deal with a wildfire.
“I was burnt [sic] out by the 2008 fire,” Rickmers said in a telephone interview. “The winds were blowing about 59 miles per hour. It was a recipe for disaster for sure.”
The fire back then was the Butte Lightning Complex Fire, which consisted of three separate wildfires, the Camp, Belden, and Pit fires, that merged into one. The 2008 blaze burned 48,000 acres, destroyed 60 structures (40 homes), and injured 24 people.
After capturing about 30 seconds of the growing Camp Fire, Rickmers said he sped back to his house.
“By the time I got back [home] the fire was already burning in my neighbor’s field,” he said.
Rickmers said he managed to get the 4-wheeler and a few other items in an open field near his home, where he thought they’d be safe from the flames. He then grabbed a duffel bag of his clothes, his dog, and his camera bag before fleeing in his truck south on Concow Road and to State Highway 70. The drive was harrowing.
“It was like driving through hell,” Rickmers recalled. “I drove through a wall of flames around Camelot that was [sic] 50 feet tall, if not more, and completely across the road.”
He would later learn that the fire took his home. The possessions he stored in the field, however, survived the blaze. But despite it all, Rickmers says he plans to stick it out in his hometown and rebuild; his spirit and resolve undamaged by the inferno.
“I might be a mess…but I’m willing to talk with anyone who might need it and I have some money if anyone needs food or anything please let me know,” he said in a Facebook post.
Camp Fire: Faces of the Fire
Watch episode 5 "Grieving Together" now: California’s leaders tell us we’ve entered a “new normal” of more intense wildfires. The truth is: Experts think the deadly mega-fires we’ve seen are just a preview of the new normal.