January 16 (Thursday) update

Today we came out of quarantine and reunited with Autumn, who was enthralled with an Lisa Frank art kit that Laura's work colleagues gave her. We attended a JPL town hall talking about impacts to JPL and plans forward. It was encouraging to hear about how JPL and NASA are supporting the community during this crisis and good to see some colleagues.

In the lobby of our hotel, some firefighters from Oakland wanted to help us bring our luggage to the car, so we were able to talk with them for a bit. They are in the area supporting the Eaton fire and were working a block from our former home while the fire was raging there. They were incredibly kind and fielded some of our questions about the fire. According to them, the fire was very intense in that area, and one of the major challenges for the Eaton fire was the need to bring in firefighting resources from further away in California and other states. Many of the more local resources were already engaged with the already burning, historic Palisades fire when the Eaton fire broke out. Unprompted, they assured us that water was not a limiting factor. Another interesting note was that most house ignitions during a wildfire like this happen when an ember gets into the house and it burns from the inside. The exterior does not usually catch fire first. Due to the 100mph winds during the fire, and neighboring houses already burning and generating heat and embers, any particular house in the fire zone was extremely susceptible to catching fire regardless of its particular characteristics. 

We were able to make the move to our interim housing at our friend's house, where Autumn and the cats are in a more comfortable setup. Due to the kindness of our extended network, we were able to replace some more specific clothes and get a few things to set up in the new housing. We got confirmation from the post office that our mail is being forwarded. Finally, we took some time to have dinner with Laura's family to celebrate her mom's birthday. Everyone seems to be settling in after a lot of transitions over the past week.