Fire Victims Workshop: Some Residents Question Initial Response to Silver Blaze

In one of the first public forums where survivors of the devastating Silver and Mountain fires met with public officials, some residents Thursday night posed pointed questions about initial responses to and warnings of the fast-moving blaze that raced through Poppet Flats and Twin Pines on Aug. 7.

The Aug. 29 meeting at Beaumont Civic Center was scheduled in cooperation with county Supervisors Marion Ashley and Jeff Stone, who joined Cal Fire-Riverside County Chief John R. Hawkins in expressing condolences to property owners who lost their homes and belongings during the fires earlier this month and in July.


About 20 residents of Poppet Flats, Twin Pines and the Mountain Center area attended. Some residents re-capped their questions and concerns after a question-and-answer period with Hawkins.

Valeria Matthew and her husband said they live in Twin Pines and they had no warning whatsoever of the Silver Fire, even though they were signed up for reverse 9-1-1 calls, which they received during the Mountain Fire.

"I work in Loma Linda," Valeria Matthew said. "I had a weird feeling. I dropped everything and I left. I did not hear anything about it. There was no warning. Basically I left work, by 2:05 I was on the road.

"Halfway through the drive I got a call from my oldest daughter saying that she smelled smoke, and by that time I could see the fire progressing."

The Matthews' children are 13, 10 and 6, she said.

"My husband and I, we were driving separately but talking with her on the phone," Valeria Matthew said. "We told her to start packing and to look outside the window and see if she could see flames.

"When we arrived home we had about a minute and a half to get them out of the house and get the dogs and the papers," she said. "We drove through the flames, with the fire engines right there.

"We got down into Banning and checked into the motel and the first thing when we turned the tv on was our house on tv burning," Valeria Matthew said. "And the truck and the RV, and everything.

"So our concern basically is lack of reverse 9-1-1 calls because we are signed up for that and we did get reverse 9-1-1 calls for the Mountain Fire."

The Matthews have lived in Twin Pines eight months, they said.

"The fact that our property when we bought it, we bought it knowing there may be a fire risk, so there was a metal roof installed, we had a fire hydrant in front of the home, a thousand feet of defensible space, not one tree on the property, and we left everything in place for the firefighters to try to save," Valeria Matthew said.

"And basically we were told they were not there to save the property, they were there to defend to the line of fire," she said. "So we had no warning, nobody knocked on the door, no reverse 9-1-1 call, nothing that we could see that anybody did to try to save either our lives or our property.

"We don't feel protected. They had two hours to do something and they did nothing."

Daniel Dexter, 62, a 10-year resident of Poppet Flats, said the first warning he received of the Silver Fire was his wife's girlfriend screaming in the front yard.

"There were 100-foot flames right behind the house," Dexter said. "We literally barely got out with our lives. It couldn't have been any closer."

Dexter said his home and everything else on his property burned to the ground.

"We could have used a 9-1-1, on the reverse. Within the last week I've got a 9-1-1 warning on a dust storm in Coachella a hundred miles away, and flash floods, but my phone didn't ring once during this fire."

Dexter also said there were many people putting their lives at risk to save others that day.

"As were driving out of the flames, there was Highway Patrolmen driving into the same flames where we had just came from," Dexter said. "We were running for our lives and they were running the opposite direction."

The blazes in August and July combined to destroy 71 structures including 33 homes, scorched more than 70 square miles of mountain watersheds, and cost firefighting and other agencies more than $35 million, according to Cal Fire and the Forest Service.

Attending the Aug. 29 meeting in Beaumont were officials representing Riverside County fire, law enforcement, emergency services, and other agencies, as well as state and federal entities including Cal Fire, the Contractors State License Board, DMV, the U.S. Small Business Administration, and volunteers from the California Southern Baptist Convention and American Red Cross.

VIDEO: Silver Fire Survivors Recall Leaving as Flames Approached

Silver Fire Survivor on 243: 'It Would Be Nice if They Would Open it Up'

SILVER FIRE RECOVERY: In Devastated Poppet Flats, Neighbors Pull Together

VIDEO: As Silver Fire Advances Evacuee Says 'We Decided to Leave on Our Own'

Video, Pics: Silver Fire South of Banning

MOUNTAIN FIRE: Some Residents Stay, but Most of Idyllwild is 'Ghost Town'

VIDEO: Idyllwild Fire Chief Discusses Evacuations, Mountain Fire Threat

MOUNTAIN FIRE PHOTOS: Property Damage, Watershed Damage, Firefighters, Pilots

Cause of Mountain Fire Determined, Electrical Equipment to Blame

See Banning-Beaumont Patch, Redlands-Loma Linda Patch and Palm Desert Patch for more previous coverage of the Silver and Mountain fires.