{"id":16389,"date":"2026-08-12T20:04:50","date_gmt":"2026-08-12T20:04:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wildgreenquest.com\/?p=16389"},"modified":"2026-08-12T20:04:50","modified_gmt":"2026-08-12T20:04:50","slug":"the-hour-by-hour-story-of-my-escape-from-the-spokane-fires","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wildgreenquest.com\/?p=16389","title":{"rendered":"The Hour-by-Hour Story of My Escape From the Spokane Fires"},"content":{"rendered":"


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Published August 12, 2026 01:12PM<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

On August, 1, 2026, three wildfires closed in on the city of Spokane, burning over 10,000 acres, leveling hundreds of homes and businesses, and forcing over 60,000 people to evacuate. As of this writing, all evacuations have been lifted, but the experience of having to flee my home still haunts me.\u00a0 I was one of thousands evacuated. This is my story.<\/em><\/p>\n\n

My family moved to Spokane, Washington, from Houston, Texas, nearly 13 years ago. Spokane offers the beauty of the Evergreen State with the convenience of being in close proximity to so many other top adventurous locations. We\u2019re on the Washington-Idaho border near numerous ski mountains and hiking trails, and just over two hours to the rugged Rocky Mountains of Montana and Canada. The Spokane River runs through the center of city, population 231,000, and offers so much for hikers, kayakers, and anglers.<\/p>\n

You can prepare for almost anything in the outdoors. But when a wildfire tore through my hometown, I learned there are some things no amount of preparation can make you ready for.<\/p>\n

At 10:30 A.M.<\/strong> on Saturday, August 1, 2026, I stood at a gas pump looking out at the church across from our old home in the Indian Trail area of Spokane, Washington. This was the neighborhood where my youngest two children started school, where they made their first friends, where we grew close to our neighbors\u2014one of whom we were on our way to see. We had just moved to another part of town.<\/p>\n

A voice interrupted my thoughts. It was an elderly lady at the pump behind me. She was looking up at the sky over the station.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe sky looks dark,\u201d she said. \u201cFeels like a fire\u2019s coming.\u201d<\/p>\n

Eight hours later, those words would haunt me.<\/p>\n

At 12:00 P.M.<\/strong><\/h2>\n

\u201cHappy birthday to you. Happy birthday to you,\u201d we sang out.<\/p>\n

I wiped frosting from my kids\u2019 faces as we loaded into the car after celebrating their friend\u2019s fifth birthday. We had moved from Spokane to the smaller community of Nine Mile Falls a week prior. As we made our way back to our new home, I glanced over at the soccer fields where my oldest son first laced up his cleats.<\/p>\n

That night, I would see those same fields again, in a photograph, surrounded by flames.<\/p>\n

12:30 P.M.<\/strong><\/h2>\n

We drove along the Spokane River to my mom and sister\u2019s house, where my kids played while I did some unpacking. We live just 12 minutes apart now, a gift I no longer take for granted. In the aftermath of one of the largest wildfires<\/a> in our city\u2019s history, that 12-minute drive between our homes became a 90-minute\u00a0journey each way.<\/p>\n

Residents work to clean up damage caused by the fires in Spokane<\/span> (Photo: Mario Tama\/Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

2:30 P.M.\u00a0<\/strong><\/h2>\n

I had my hands in an unpacked box when my phone rang. \u201cApparently, there\u2019s a fire near South Bank. We\u2019re evacuating,\u201d my neighbor said. Where is South Bank?<\/em> I thought.<\/p>\n

Then the power went out.<\/p>\n

I looked at my daughter, who was struggling to find her rhythm in our new space. \u201cI doubt this will be anything,\u201d I told her. \u201cFire season. You know?\u201d<\/p>\n

I didn\u2019t pack a bag. There was no official evacuation notice, after all. But the power was<\/em> out, so we drove the 12 minutes to my family\u2019s house anyway. I pulled up to find my dad packing the boat. Our annual family lake week was set to begin the next day, and there was an excitement in the air. I glanced at the sky. It seemed a little darker, maybe. But none of us felt threatened.<\/p>\n

Inside, my sister quietly pulled me aside and whispered that a fire had just started two houses down from our cousin\u2019s on Autumn Lane\u2014about a seven-minute drive from our new home.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019ve evacuated. They think their house is already gone.\u201d<\/p>\n

I walked away so the kids wouldn\u2019t see me cry, tears already falling. Still, I convinced myself it would be a short-lived tragedy, quickly contained.<\/p>\n

\"TOPSHOT
Recovered items are left on the driveway of a burned home during the Old Trails fire in Spokane<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

4:00 P.M.\u00a0<\/strong><\/h2>\n

\u201cI\u2019m going to go get us food. I need something to do,\u201d I told my brother-in-law.<\/p>\n

I left alone for the grocery store a few minutes away. There was still no evacuation order in place. But when I pulled in, the lines of people waiting for gas spilled into the neighboring business\u2019 parking lot, blocking my way through. They must know something I don\u2019t,<\/em> I thought.<\/p>\n

From where I stood, there were no other signs of worry. Thirty minutes later, when I walked back through that parking lot, everything would look different.<\/p>\n

Midway through my deli order, the phones started ringing off the hook. Employees began leaving. It took a while to get my food as the store filled with people, more crowded than I\u2019d ever seen it.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just evacuated from Indian Trail,\u201d a man behind me said. \u201cApparently, I trapped myself between two fires.\u201d<\/p>\n

He can\u2019t mean the Autumn Lane fire, I thought. Wait! Indian Trail?! My old neighborhood. The place I\u2019d just been that morning.<\/p>\n

Then I walked outside and saw flames that weren\u2019t there before, rising behind the store . I felt my chest tighten and my breathing change. We were in gridlock, trying to get out. I couldn\u2019t get away fast enough to outrun my worry.<\/p>\n

\u201cMom?\u201d I called her phone again and again, but I couldn\u2019t reach her. My cell wouldn\u2019t work.<\/p>\n

I finally reached the road back, pulling up just in time to see dark billows of smoke rolling toward the house where my family was gathered. By then, my mom had been trapped on the road for hours as the Old Trails Fire spread rapidly through town.<\/p>\n

She walked through the door just as the evacuation alerts sounded on our phones.<\/p>\n

6:00 P.M.<\/strong><\/h2>\n

We packed our cars as quickly as we could, but the smoke was boxing us in. I took off in a panic when my brother-in-law looked behind him and started yelling, \u201cGo! Go! Go!\u201d as things flew out of my car.<\/p>\n

Even as the fire moved closer, we still thought we\u2019d be gone for one night\u2014maybe<\/em>.<\/p>\n

It took us an abnormally long two hours from Nine Mile Falls to reach the mountain cabin where I\u2019d spent so many days exploring as a kid.<\/p>\n

There, we were isolated from what was happening. We stayed glued to our phones, searching for every update we could find. We heard reports about the Old Trails Fire spreading through town, but it wasn\u2019t until my son received a text from a friend that we realized just how bad things had become at home.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis can\u2019t be real,\u201d we said, staring at a photo of his high school surrounded by flames.<\/p>\n

\"Lakeside
Lakeside High School with flames behind it during the Autumn Lane Fire that started on August 1<\/span> (Photo: My son\u2019s friend)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

We later learned that firefighters had fought like hell to save it.<\/p>\n

Because we\u2019d already packed for lake week, our cars and campers were stocked with supplies and food, something we\u2019d be grateful for in the days to come.<\/p>\n

We would spend a week in those mountains.<\/p>\n

August 11, 2026\u00a0<\/strong><\/h2>\n

As I type this, 11 days after evacuation, I\u2019m home, and my house still stands. The National Guard just left after being stationed on my street while the fire here was being contained. I stay up each night giving my son breathing treatments. Even minimal exposure to the smoke wrecks havoc on his asthmatic body. I\u2019ve heard a few folks say that it\u2019s not usual wildfire smoke that we\u2019re inhaling. The fire also burned tires, computer batteries and insulation, among other materials. We\u2019re breathing in that smoke as well.<\/p>\n

Getting information about what the fire burned is still difficult. I\u2019ve been able to drive the main road I live off of and see some trees and homes that lay in ruins. This is the hardest part\u2014not being able to confirm what we\u2019ve heard. How much of my old neighborhood is gone? How much of my new neighborhood is gone? How many of us have lost our homes, our businesses, our favorite places in our city?<\/em><\/p>\n

I heard that 30 families at my kids\u2019 old elementary school lost their homes, that entire neighborhoods have been leveled, that our favorite trails are burned and historic sites gone.<\/p>\n

My story is only one of tens of thousands from this day, and I was more fortunate than many.<\/p>\n

The fire near me is mostly contained, and the conversation around it grows quieter online. But today, I passed by a stranger who I saw crying. I asked if she needed an embrace. We held each other for a moment without words. We know that this is only the beginning. This small community that is now my home will never be the same.<\/p>\n


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Published August 12, 2026 01:12PM On August, 1, 2026, three wildfires closed in on the city of Spokane, burning over 10,000 acres, leveling hundreds of homes and businesses, and forcing over 60,000 people to evacuate. As of this writing, all evacuations have been lifted, but the experience of having to flee my home still haunts<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16390,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16389","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wild-living"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wildgreenquest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16389","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wildgreenquest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wildgreenquest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wildgreenquest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wildgreenquest.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=16389"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wildgreenquest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16389\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wildgreenquest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/16390"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wildgreenquest.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=16389"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wildgreenquest.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=16389"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wildgreenquest.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=16389"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}