A retro blue VW van miraculously survives deadly Los Angeles fire
Preston Martin thought the retro blue Volkswagen van he slept in for a year during college was a thing of the past, having parked it in a Malibu neighborhood just before the war. the Palisades Fire torn through, reducing homes and cars to rubble and charred metal.
So the surfboard maker was stunned to discover that the vehicle survived. Not only that, a photo of the lively bus, taken by an Associated Press photographer, circulated widely on television and online, bringing a certain joy to viewers.
“There is magic in that van,” 24-year-old Martin said in an interview with AP on Tuesday. “It doesn’t make sense why this happened. There should have been some toast, but here we are.”
The area remains closed to the public, and neither Martin nor the friend and business partner he sold the van to last summer, Megan Krystle Weinraub, have been able to inspect the vehicle. Other photos of the van appear to show soot on the windows, Martin said.
Martin bought the 1977 Volkswagen Type 2 somewhat on a whim sometime around his freshman year studying mechanical engineering at the University of California, Santa Barbara.
His mother, Tracey Martin, from Irvine, yelled at him for blowing his money, but Martin told her he would save on rent by fixing up the inside and living in it for his senior year, which he did . She grew to love the bus and sewed curtains for the windows.
Last summer he sold the van to 29-year-old Weinraub, who designs surf and skateboard boards under the Vibrant Boards brand. Martin makes carbon fiber surfboards under Starlite.
On Jan. 5, the friends drove to go surfing in the van, which Weinraub calls Azul — Spanish for “blue.” Then Martin parked it on a flat spot up the hill from her apartment at the Getty Villa, because she’s still learning to drive the manual transmission.
Two days later the Palisades a fire broke outand Weinraub fled with her dog, Bodi, and some dog food in her primary car. She felt sad for Azul, but that was minor compared to those who lost their homes or loved ones.
On Thursday, a neighbor sent her a photo. In the background was the bus, still blue and white and not damaged at all.
“I panicked,” she said. “I was in the bathroom and I screamed.”
She called Martin, who also panicked. He called his mother, who was ecstatic. “I’ve never cried over a car before,” Tracey Martin texted her son.
They were even more surprised when the AP photo was broadcast on television and appeared online.
“We made the news,” Martin said on Instagram, and Weinraub contacted the photographer.
Weinraub, whose home survived, doesn’t know when she will be allowed to return to her apartment or to Azul. The two are happy that the van’s survival has touched so many people.
“It’s so cool that it has become a beacon of hope,” Martin said. “Everything around it was toast, just destroyed. And then there is this bright blue shiny van.”