As Glass fire threat ebbs, Sonoma County marks anniversary of deadly 2017 firestorm

The Glass fire that once burned fiercely in eastern Sonoma County and across both sides of the Napa Valley had greatly diminished Thursday, as authorities lifted more evacuation orders allowing residents close to the burn scars to return home.

In its 12th day, the Glass fire hit another scar: the anniversary of the 2017 October firestorm.

On that Oct. 8 night three years ago, more than a dozen major fires broke out across the two counties amid a windstorm that fanned blazes into infernos. Thousands of homes were destroyed, from rural enclaves to suburban Santa Rosa neighborhoods. Twenty-four Sonoma County residents were killed, some in their homes and others as they tried to flee the flames.

Firefighters stopped the Glass fire before it could make a similar, devastating run through dense neighborhoods, and authorities issued sufficient warnings to get most people out before the firefight began.

In Sonoma County, every major fire carries an indelible mark from 2017.

“All of you that are here today were possibly here in that time in 2017,” Cal Fire unit Chief Shana Jones said Thursday morning during the agency’s tactical briefing on the fire at the Sonoma County Fairgrounds. “And as you travel to and from the fire lines back and forth to the (Glass fire) incident, you’ve probably driven through the Tubbs footprint, which has changed the lives of everyone here.”

Cal Fire ended its briefing with a moment of silence for those killed during the fires three years ago.

Santa Rosa Fire Chief Tony Gossner said it was important to reflect on all the community has endured since 2017.

“I think it’s important for everyone — us firefighters — to know what that means for our area,” Gossner said.

The Glass fire threatened to become that kind of unstoppable blaze when embers first ignited off St. Helena Road, sending fingers of fire burning into Skyhawk in east Santa Rosa and over Hood Mountain, through the community along Los Alamos Road and across Highway 12.

But firefighters stopped the fire from advancing further.

A damage map released Saturday by the city of Santa Rosa showed 30 destroyed buildings, mostly homes, indicating that the majority of the damage in Sonoma County was outside city limits.

The overall tally of homes destroyed in the Glass fire rose to 336 single- and multifamily homes in Sonoma County and 307 homes in Napa County by Thursday’s count. Those numbers are expected to continue rising as fire crews assess damage caused by the blaze.

On Thursday night, the fire was at 67,484 acres and 70% containment.

Evacuation orders for several Sonoma County neighborhoods were lifted Thursday afternoon, including areas northeast of Rincon Valley along Calistoga Road and west of the Napa County line between Petrified Forest Road and the Glass fire burn scar.

Mandatory evacuations were also removed for a portion of land east of Adobe Canyon Road along the fire’s perimeter and for two areas northwest of Kenwood along Highway 12.

In Napa County, evacuation orders were downgraded to warnings in the rural community of Angwin, in areas within the Conn Valley northwest of Lake Hennessey and sections of the Silverado Trail, among others.

The enormous losses in 2017 — 5,300 homes in Sonoma County and thousands more across the region — began a reckoning across California with the growing threat of wildfires that has transformed protocols for evacuations and emergency warnings. Those fires, the Camp fire that destroyed the town of Paradise in 2018 and big wildfires since, have tested the state’s ability to put enough personnel on the fire line.

It has also put scores of families of those who died and thousands more who lost their homes and everything inside on a yearslong journey of grief and recovery.

About 6 miles northwest of the fairgrounds, Houston Evans sat down for lunch at his family’s ranch on a rural northern stretch of Coffey Lane. He reflected on the three years that have passed since his mother, Valerie Evans, died after she ran back into her burning home to try rescue her aging dog, Scooter.

Valerie Lynn Evans, a professional equestrian well known in the local trucking industry, was 75. She is dearly missed every day, and the three-year anniversary of her death is “a somber day, and just another day,” her son said.

On Sept. 27 when the Glass fire spread into Sonoma County, the terrifying blaze glowed bright in the hills and was visible from the Evans family property adjacent to the highway, known widely as the home of Texas longhorn Angel.

“That burned so brightly that it looked like it was coming over into Santa Rosa,” Evan said. “It really had our hearts racing, we didn’t know that the fire was as far away as it was.”

Houston Evans recalled he, his soon-to-be wife and his parents were frantically gathering animals and belongings the night of Oct. 8, 2017, as embers from the Tubbs fire cascaded across six lanes of Highway 101.

”I’m just trying to get through it and pray that nothing else bad befalls California and the wonderful people who live here,” Evans said. “I feel so bad for everybody else who just lost their homes. They are really at the beginning of a very long journey.”

Staff Writers Ethan Varian and Nashelly Chavez contributed to this report. You can reach Staff Writer Julie Johnson at 707-521-5220 or julie.johnson@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @jjpressdem.

Editor’s Note: An earlier version of this story gave an incorrect date for the first day of the Glass fire and misstated the directional orientation of the Coffey Park neighborhood and the Sonoma County Fairgrounds in Santa Rosa. The fire erupted Sept. 27 and Coffey Park is northwest of the fairgrounds.