The defining moment was seeing the sorrow in him and regret for wanting to have been able to do more. Here’s a man who has built a career fighting fires but has never experienced a fire this close to home.
Chace Beech, multimedia journalist for Spectrum News 1
A defining moment for me was driving back to the Palisades village on Wednesday and seeing a neighborhood I’ve known well completely devastated. It’s a sight that’s hard to process.
Stephanie Sy, national correspondent for PBS News Hour
I interviewed a young woman at the main evacuation center in the Palisades. She had been staying at a church-run shelter for a few months to escape an abusive relationship. The Palisades fire reached the church and caught on fire in the middle of the night while she was sleeping. She fled with her backpack and took several buses and got to the evacuation center on foot. She was reading the Bible when I noticed her and seemed at peace. But as she recounted what she had just been through, she just started shaking and sobbing. She asked, when is all this pain going to end? I had no answer. But she said she would keep praying.
Dan Grossman, national correspondent for Scripps News
The image of a man walking down Iliff Street in the Pacific Palisades with nothing but a trash bag will stick with me for the rest of my life. He walked with a hunch; smoke, ash, and collapsed rubble lining both sides of the street next to him. As he approached, I asked if he lived in the area and if he needed any help. He looked up, eyes streaming with tears, and mumbled “my home” through a broken voice. It’s all he could say as he passed and wept.
I covered the Lahaina wildfires for 9 days. I rode out Hurricane Ian and covered the aftermath. I reported on the Marshall Fire in Colorado the night it broke out, but nothing broke me like this one encounter. There is something about witnessing an event’s darkest moments at the same time those affected are experiencing them that is tragically beautiful. It’s the human experience in its rawest state. It’s what makes these stories matter. It’s what connects us all.
