Last month I blogged about the Great Laguna Beach fire of 1993. We received some amazing responses to the post from locals who lived in Laguna at the time. We wanted to share some of these stories with you because as Laguna Local Doug Miller put it: “this is history”.
Aaron Peluso:
“I remember being up on skyline watching the flames come over the summit on the other side of the canyon… the wall of flame was at least 10 times higher than the tiny fire trucks which appeared to be getting the heck out. Later that night we had ash rain down all around town, and then the following morning/days Laguna was a ghost town. I ended up skimboarding perfect Aliso by myself with about 50 fire trucks parked on coast highway and the off duty firefighters on the pier cheering whenever I got a good one.
I met up with my buddy David Disman on bike (sneaking back into town early) so that we could ride to Emerald Bay to see if his house was still there. It was. The two houses behind his got burned down and the corner of his house caught fire. There were empty drink bottles around the yard and the hose was strewn about. A note on the table explained that the house caught fire, the fire department bailed and this guy picked up the garden hose and saved the house.
It was a crazy experience being a 16/17 year old having grown up in such an otherwise stable and safe environment. I wrote a paper about my experiences as part of my application to college and I like to think it helped get me in.”
David Arvelo:
“Crazy to think back to that day. I was framing a house with Conley Ware. When the cops drove past the house telling us to evacuate. Once we rolled up and got to the bottom of the hill you could see the first house on fire on skyline. Such a crazy day. I was able to get back in the next day and 3 water dropping helicopters were sitting on the sands of main beach with firefighters up and down Ocean Ave sleeping on cots.”
Douglas Miller:
“The morning of the fire, I was downtown and took pictures of the Boardwalk after doing my chores at the Post Office and the bank. I took a bus home and got a call from Mary Frances Brown who hired me to go with her out to her son’s studio in the Canyon to photograph his antique furniture. When she arrived to pick me up, we could see smoke rising from the direction of Laguna Canyon. I took a couple pictures on the way. I did my photo work and by then the fire was raging and blowing into Laguna on the north side of the canyon.
I took pictures of people wetting down their roofs with garden hoses. I had Mary drop me off on Broadway and I walked to the Boardwalk and took pictures of the fire approaching Main Beach. Then I walked up into Heisler Park -Saw Donita Lloyd at Monument Point. From there, I decided to go back to downtown. At that time the fire appeared to have jumped the canyon to the south side. When I got to the Laguna Hotel, I called Becky. who was worried and wanted me to come home. The Blumenfeld’s were on the sidewalk by their truck near the hotel. They had no way to know the status of their house on Canyon Acres.
I walked on Glenneyre and took a few pictures of the evacuation, the cars jammed bumper to bumper -people on their way south and out of town. I stopped at Albertson’s Market and got something and took pictures of people in the parking lot. Several confused and not sure where to go.
When I got home we thought of ways to try to protect our house. But the smoke never reached us. The low-lying smoke didn’t spread much south of Thalia Street.
That night I went up on the roof of TOPS next door and the fire could be seen through the smoke as houses burned above the High School.
The next morning, Jesse and I walked to Main Beach. The Highway was blocked off. So we waked on the beach to Main Beach where we walked on the boardwalk and up to the where the officials had set up HQ’s near Broadway. We walked up the path to Heisler Park so I cold take pictures of the helicopters and the general view. A hazy scene. Then back down on the Highway to Broadway and across at the light to Beach Street where the police stopped traffic. Then to Ocean Ave up to Forest and past City Hall. The Canyon was blocked of course. I was there to take whatever pictures I could of what was going on, but I had to budget my film and made it stretch the best that I could.
Then we walked on Third St up to Park Ave and up to the High School -Onto Blumont and Hilledge Dr. Pictures of burnt and smoldering homes and Firemen putting out hot spots. To Skyline Dr and the burned orange tree and on up Park Ave to Wendt Terrace. where we got a drink of water from a man who’s house was saved by a team of firefighters who used his swimming pool for a source of water. A few pictures of the hillside of burned houses on the south side of Park Ave. The we walked on Wendt Terrace to Thalia Street and home I was out of film. That was our big adventure that day after the fire.”
Brian Roark:
“We got our stuff out of our house in E-Bay (Emerald Bay) with the houses across the street on fire. Fire trucks formed a barrier by me and Kristi and Roxy McKnight’s house and saved us. The house where my dad and I parked our car with my sisters in it ended up burning down. Watched as our friends house that we rented when we first moved to Laguna burned and received the news that their dogs were still inside. Remember going to school half days and in truck trailers for the remainder of time at Thurston.
I remember thinking E-Bay looked like a scene out of a world war 2 movie. When I went to college at SDSU I took a natural disasters course… first or second chapter of the book was about the Laguna fire and one of the worst in history. The teacher asked me to get up and share my experience with the whole class. Never forget being evacuated from Thurston and driving down Park Avenue and seeing the flames go over the hill at E-Bay. Dan Davison and I were on the bus like Holy Sh*t!…that’s when we knew it was the real deal.”
Peter Meier:
“That was freshman year of High school for me. We went to Corona del Mar and could see the smoke from school that day. They closed PCH at Cameo Shores, so I had to walk from there. We emptied out the house in Crystal Cove, and could hear the propane tanks exploding in El Morro trailer park. That’s they day my sister Jane met Greg Burzell -he helped empty the house onto the sand.
When it got dark we went onto the bluff across from where the Crystal Cove shopping center and Irvine ranch developments are, and put out embers and small fires as they came across PCH to the ocean side. Watching the fire line burn the hillside was serene. Fire fighters were scrambling around starting back fires (unsuccessfully attempting to stop the progression). We were lucky to not lose our house. Crazy day.”
Jeff Gomez:
“I woke up the next morning and checked the surf at treasure island… it was like refugee camp on the sand and the parking lot of Aliso was packed with fire trucks and fire fighters recovering. I remember standing on the roof of the science building (the high school was still under construction) with a group of maybe 20 other kids, watching it crest the next peak to the north. Everybody kind of decided that was a good time to go.”
While it was a time of tears, loss and great shock, it was also a time of thankfulness and gratitude for the firefighting crews who had fought so desperately for us all, and a time of compassion and caring for our neighbors, our children and ourselves.
Thanks to everyone who shared their personal story with us, and a special thanks to Doug Miller for sharing his fantastic photographs. If you have a story to tell, please don’t hesitate to comment below! Let’s keep history alive, so we can learn from the past and prevent such a calamity from ever happening again!
About Jaleesa Peluso, Laguna Beach Realtor
Jaleesa Peluso is real estate agent with Berkshire Hathaway. Jaleesa and her team specialize in Laguna Beach, Dana Point, Laguna Niguel, Newport Beach and surrounding areas. Thinking of buying, selling or renting? Call us now at (949)395-0960!