Indians return to gutted homes in California

With the fire slackening, many evacuees return home to find their houses, cars, shops reduced to cinders  

NEW YORK: Firefighters in southern California gained ground as winds eased and they allowed some residents in hard-hit San Diego County back to their streets, many lined with the wreckage of burnt out houses and cars.

Mahendra Hazariwala, treasurer for the Gujarati Association of San Diego (GASD), said the estimated 2,000 Indian families forced to flee the fire had started trickling home. In upscale Rancho Bernardo, where many Gujarati doctors and businessman live, house after house burnt to cinders.

Lalit Savla, who lives in Rancho Bernardo’s upscale West Wood neighbourhood, knew what he would find when he came back on Wednesday night because an official warned him his house was lost. He was staying with his Indian friends. 
“At least 150 houses were destroyed in West Wood which has many Gujarati families. We are opening up our houses for friends. It will take months for them to get insurance money out to rebuild their homes,” an exhausted Hazariwala, who himself had been on the road with his family for three nights, told DNA over the telephone.
 
“We are also looking at pooling cars because people have lost their cars. They will have to start commuting to work. School is closed for a week but we have to normalise,” said Hazariwala who is a San Diego state engineer. “We are just riding out the stressful situation,” added Hazariwala who is relieved to be home after fleeing from the fire at his back. “We would settle into a safe house and then reverse 911 calls would come warning us to get out. This happened three times.”

Most damaged Indian establishments in the area including private medical clinics, restaurants and convenience stores have insurance. “Despite their own personal troubles Indian doctors are working round the clock in San Diego to help patients,” said Hemant Kumar Patel, who is the president of the American Association of Physicians of Indian Origin (AAPI). According to the hospitals, there are relatively few people seeking treatment for burns compared to the numbers seeking relief for breathing ailments because of the heavy soot and poor air quality.
 
“I do feel clogged and have been feeling shortness of breath,” said Raj Vadhera, a volunteer in southern California’s Self Realisation Fellowship group. “I am trying to rest and shut out the frightening spectacle of a line of fire leaping at us while we were driving to a friend’s safe house,” said Vadhera.  
      
Half a million people were evacuated in San Diego County alone, as part of the largest mass evacuation in California history.