LittleWolf Fire Story
The Ceder Fire in San Diego County was a little too "up front and personal".

Happy Thanksgiving! We have a lot to be thankful for! Emergency Announcement! A heartfelt Thank You to the kind people who have donated funds to the San Diego Animal Rescue.  We were right in the path of the devastating fire that scoured San Diego County the last week of October, and destroyed so many homes and lives. We started to evacuate as the flames roared into the meadow across the street, threatening our lives and the lives of our Shibas. (pictures coming soon). Our truck would not start and I was panicked and in the greatest despair of saving our dear animals and our own lives, when, as if by magic, Angels, in the form of the San Diego Animal Rescue, arrived at the front gate and helped me load nine Shibas, twelve cats, six kittens, nine hens and three goats into three vans and two cars. We were convoyed to safety (although we had to re-evacuate later) and everyone survived in good health.  Our home is intact. My husband bravely stayed to fight the fire. It came first to our doorstep, was beaten off and then crossed the freeway and came around the back way, trying yet again to burn us out. We are back home now and starting the clean-up. Sonia had a healthy litter and Simone, Buffy and Woo are expecting (we hope). However, while the SDAR was saving other peoples' animals, they too had to evacuate their own facilities on Dunbar lane. The fire completely burned out their cat facilities and took the storage garage with cages, food and supplies. If you could possibly spare a donation of any amount, no matter how small, to help rebuild their facility, anything would be graciously received and acknowledged. These generous and caring people risked their lives to save animals all over the county. Littlewolf Industries will be eternally grateful. Please address checks or money orders to:  San Diego Animal Rescue (tax deductible). Send to: Littlewolf Industries 9509 Chocolate Summit Drive El Cajon, CA 92021 I'll pass them along and make sure everyone gets a receipt. Thank you, in advance, for your generosity and compassion. Susan

We live on the corner of Dunbar Lane and Old Hyway 80 and got a media's eye view of the fire trucks racing down the street to help save our neighbor's homes. They lost about half of them. Before and as this picture was taken, we could hear the booming explosions of the propane tanks blowing up as the fire progressed down the mountain. Fire is on the right just past the tree. Evacuees are streaming down the other side of the street. The smoke has completely covered the sky and the Highway Patrolman, at the far right, is directing traffic away from Dunbar Lane, which is now closed to all but emergency traffic. The windmill is a functional weathervane and you can see that the wind is coming from the North East, typical for a Santa Ana. The white water truck might have been the one that was caught in the fire later and burned up. At this point, we started loading everything with a heart beat into every available cage and carrier and heading the cars out the gate. I was starting to get really nervous and scared because we didn't have enough cars to take all the crates. Help arrived just before the picture below was taken. This is when I, and three other vehicles filled with our animals, took off from the front gate, immediately to the left of this picture. The car out here was abandoned when the frantic driver could not get it to start. A water truck caught fire and burned right down this street to the right of this picture, about 30 minutes later. The fire then jumped the highway in back of the house and threatened to burn us out from the freeway side. Bill stayed and protected us from burning with a garden hose! Someone got it on film. This is what the hill looked like on thursday morning. The man did finally come and get his car.

Tuesday afternoon, the third and last evacuation point on our journey.
This is the Flying A Ranch in Campo, pretty close to the Mexican border.
The sky is overcast with smoke from the fires to the north. My three goats are
in the pen with ponies and other goats, sheep and a few horses.
The rest of the ranch has taken in over 200 horses and they are still coming.
This ranch belongs to Father Joe of the St. Vincent DePaul organization.
They were kind and fed us well. I left on Wednesday afternoon,
rescued by the owners of one of our puppies. He was one of the Shibas
that we had to evacuate. We had to come back via Highway 94,
because Hyway 8 was still closed.
I will be eternally grateful to all the people who helped us and gave us food
and water and protection during a very frightening and uncertain four days.

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