Behind the lines of red-hot wildfires, volunteers save animals with a warm heart and a cool head

COHASSET, California — As firefighters continued to battle the California largest forest fire of the year Norm Rosene spent 18 hours a day behind the fire lines doing a different job: rescuing animals.

Hidden in an old wooden shed in the decimated forest town of Cohasset In Northern California, his team came across a newborn calf that looked only a few days old. The mother was protectively watching over her baby as he nursed.

“It’s crucial for us to get food and water … especially as temperatures are expected to rise into the hundreds of degrees over the next few days,” the 66-year-old volunteer said. “They drink a lot of water, especially the mother needs water and food to be able to suckle the calf.”

He made sure that smoldering hay and small fires still burning near the barn were extinguished, alerted the fire brigade and moved on to the next house.

More than 26,000 residents have been evacuated due to the Park Fire and more than 600 square miles have burned, leaving cats, dogs, chickens, horses and goats behind.

Concerned owners rely on volunteers like Rosene to rescue their beloved pets and keep their livestock alive until they can return home.

“If people can’t take their animals, sometimes they want to stay,” Rosene said. “So if we can come and help them take their animals, then they get out of that disaster area and they’re safer and they feel better because they didn’t leave their animals behind.”

When the Park Fire started last Wednesday, Rosene initially thought it wouldn’t come his way. But by evening, the wind had shifted. He and his wife, Janice, evacuated their home in Chico around 1 a.m.

“It’s almost scary because the wind is blowing and the fire is roaring and coming right at you. The glowing embers look like fireflies shooting through the air,” Rosene said, showing footage of a blood-red sky covered in thick columns of black smoke.

But the fire quickly burned through his area, thankfully leaving his home intact, and within hours he and his wife were working to evacuate animals.

The couple began volunteering 12 years ago with the North Valley Animal Disaster Group, a team that now numbers about 300 volunteers. They’re trained in everything from floods to fires, and almost every type of rescue you can think of — helicopter rescue, high-altitude rope rescue, search and rescue — as well as animal behavior and handling.

“That’s why our team gets to work behind the fire lines and within the fire emergency system, because we integrate with them and don’t get in the way of the firefighters,” Rosene said. “They like having us there because when they find an animal, they don’t know what to do with it.”

They have dealt with all sorts of animals and Rosene is the team’s designated snake and lizard handler. He has even evacuated two giant emus and their chicks. Every pet is worth saving.

Large animals are meant to stay in place as long as they are safe.

“If they get stressed by fire and smoke … and you’re now trying to load them into a trailer or a truck, that can be a real challenge,” he said.

If they need to be evacuated, Rosene and others coax them into the back of their trailer and take them to Camelot Equestrian Park. Smaller animals like cats and dogs are taken to an emergency shelter in Oroville.

Sometimes owners bring in their animals if they can’t care for them, Rosene said. There are about 100 at the Park Fire’s small animal shelter and 70 at its large animal shelter, and they’re caring for another 850 animals in the evacuation area.

Even after a fire is out in an area, it can take days for an evacuation order to be lifted. Crews must clean up the many hazards that arise after a fire, such as falling trees and power lines, exposed nails and broken glass, and tree holes filled with glowing embers.

During the devastating Camp Fire in 2018, which destroyed several towns, including nearly the entire community of Paradise, Rosene and others helped more than 4,000 displaced animals. He and the group’s founder, John Maretti, traveled to more than a dozen countries to educate and respond to disasters.

“If there’s one lesson, it’s that people need to be prepared to take their pets with them during a fire,” Rosene said. “So if they have an emergency kit for themselves, they should have an emergency kit for their pets.”

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Associated Press reporter Jaimie Ding reported from Los Angeles.