UPDATE 8/26 9:00 AM:
The Mountain Daily News just got some pictures of the Rose home on Lebec Rd. and added them to this story.

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Judy Rose wrote to non-local friends praying for them and asking for an update on the fire. 

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Dear Prayer Team,

Many of you had been praying about our being in the Lebec Fire (now called the “Post Fire”), but may not be aware of how much in danger we were and how completely and miraculously your prayers were answered.  Here are some details that we trust will be a blessing to you…

No one was on our property when the fire started.  A lady from our church, Marsha Green, was at her teaching position at Tejon School, but  headed to the post office during her lunch break.  She went past our driveway and saw a brush fire had just started about 25 feet outside and  just to the south of our gate (this was the very beginning of the Post Fire). She called 911 to report it, then called our home, but got no answer.  Fearing that my mother may be here alone, and seeing that the fire was heading into our property and toward my mother’s house, she called the church office and alerted Fred.  He sped home from Lake of the Woods, but the sheriff’s department had already set up a barricade around the corner near the Lebec Church.  He parked the car there and ran the rest of the way.  Our property was engulfed in flames and smoke, and there was a fire truck here doing their best to protect the property and keep it from spreading to surrounding areas. He couldn’t see ahead as he ran up the long driveway through the smoke, but his being there turned out to be very important.

 

Fred was able to get our dog inside, start the rooftop sprinklers, and then get a garden hose and start hosing down the fire in the backyard (which burned down the steep hillside to the edge of the narrow lawn behind our house).  The fire  started up the bark and lower branches of some of the big trees bordering the lawn, but Fred was able to get it out with the hose.  Our daughter Michelle got the message and rushed in from where she was in Frazier Park (she somehow got past the barricade) and started frantically working with her dad to protect the houses.  Michelle ran down to my mother’s home on the property and saw fire starting in the trees next to her home , so she quickly brought a long hose from the orchard and was able to extinguish it before it engulfed the trees and spread to the house.   Our son David was at his first day of work 10 minutes away at the  Grapevine Starbucks when a customer alerted him to what was happening in Lebec, so he was able to head home to join the team along with Christi, who arrived also.  Our power pole (PG&E) was ablaze, so Fred with David’s help got some hoses connected and were able to get the pole fire out.  (The fire burned a hole right through the pole, but it was still standing tenuously, so we had power which kept our well pump going, supplying us with water, and kept the lights and phones on.)

 

Fire crews from around southern California parked here overnight to keep hot spots on our hillsides from flaring up again. (Christi served Frappuccino’s)  Our son Timothy arrived later after his college classes (he hadn’t heard about the fire), and he and Brandon Kearney took up buckets of water to douse smoldering trees around us.  Through the night and today the family could hear scrub oak trees falling over on the hillsides as the burning in their trunks weakened them.

I know many of you have prayed for my 85 year old mother, Elsa.  The Lord made sure she was protected from this drama.  I had taken her out to enjoy a brunch at the nearby Denny’s, which had just opened.  When we came out, we could see what looked like smoke from a grass fire in the distance and so we headed toward home quickly.  Just around the bend from our home the sheriff’s department had set up the barricade. We could tell this was a crisis, as huge plumes of smoke were pouring out of our property and we could see fire burning the ridges surrounding it on all three side.  My mom and I prayed from the Lebec Church parking lot, and trusted our family, possessions and the property to God’s keeping and asked that His name would be glorified through this crisis.  We also asked God to allow the Youth Bible Studies to continue to be a blessing  to the many who attend on Sunday nights here.

 

A gardener let me into the Lebec Church office to make a call to Bonnie Greer to alert our church and others for prayer.  I took my mother to the close-by Holiday Inn Express to give her a safe place to rest, and where I could make and receive phone calls from family members.  My mother and I were finally allowed back on the property after 8:30 p.m. Tuesday night, and my brother, Dave Coppedge, had just arrived.  We had a praise and thanksgiving session together as we marveled at how no one was hurt and our homes, our  big landscape trees, and all structures on the property had been preserved.  (PG&E even sent a crew around midnight to stabilize the burned pole to keep it from being blown down.)  Because of the strong smoke and smoldering fires, I kept my mother at the motel for the night where she had a good rest.

 

Our current status:  My mother is now back in her home with us. We are all surrounded inside and out by the strong smell of smoke, but instead of it bringing a sense of fear, it is actually the aroma of God’s protection as we marvel at how impossible it was for this much fire to roll through our enclosed property with this little damage. We are so thankful for our Fire Department, who worked hard to handle this fast moving wildfire and the crews from all over Southern California who spent the night watching over it.  I am so thankful for our children and Fred who worked together tirelessly to do all they could to protect the houses and trees.  God truly has answered prayer and has been merciful to us!

Thank you all for the crucial part you played in this drama by your intercessory prayers for us.

Judy Rose

P.S. Please continue to pray about the fires in many of the tree trunks on our hillsides. We understand that there is still some danger as these can sometimes smolder for many days.  (Timothy is making hikes around our steep hills dousing fires with a backpack sprayer full of water.) Pray also for the safety of the fire crews who are in our community continuing to fight the fire, as it has not yet been contained.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Looking south on the Rose home nestled between ridges.