Reporter mel knee woodrow in middle town. Most residents have not been allowed here and you can see why. This home, totally destroyed. All thats left standing here is really a swing set. But as we pan around, another street just directly or rather another home just directly across the street has been okay. This is what it looks like not far from Middletown Community United Methodist church. Homes in ashes. It survived the 1918 fire of middle town that took out all of downtown. So, 97 years later, it also survived. Our faith gives us strength to get over these tough times. Chp says this driver from Hidden Valley became verbally combative with firefighters in middle town because they didnt save his friends home. Law enforcemented officers escorted the man out. A much different scenario from the largely faithdriven community that has taken this in stride. Lake county, theres, you know, a big indian background here. And then, of course, urban hot springs is here so it is a spirituallybased
When others could not. Sheriff said from the location of the body and other evidence at the Anderson Springs site it is likely that of 69yearold leonard neft former reporter with the San Jose Mercury news and we spoke with his wife. She spoke with hill on saturday after the fire broke out. Houston time we talk he said he did not think he was going to be able to get out and he would try to hike out if he had to. Crews went out with dogs to search for those missing and they found the body presumed to that of neft and bruce burns reported missing september 14. They will work to confirm the identities of the two men. They have confirmed the identity of 72yearold Barbara Mcwilliams a former School Teacher with m. S. Who was found in her burned out home in middletown on sunday. At least one more man is thought to be missing, searchers will try to find out what may have happened to him, all while colleagues on the other side of trying to get a handle that is only 35 percent contained. Residen
Like, life goes on as they say. Reporter firefighters say the rain yesterday was incredibly welcome but it also did bring some challenges making the terrain a little bit tougher to maneuver yesterday. They say theyre starting to be exhausted but taking care of themselves because certainly this fire fight is long from over. Reporting live from middletown tonight, michelle roberts, nbc bay area news. Michelle, thank you. Here comes the other change. The rain is out and the high heat is coming back in. This will hurt the fire fight. Chief meteorologist jeff ranieri has our updated forecast and rain totals we saw. Along the fire lines,. 4 an inch, definitely good news as we keep saying. Thats the obvious point. The fire forecast for tomorrow, mostly sunny conditions. Temperatures warming up by about 10 degrees to 85. Winds within the fire could gust as high as 25 miles per hour. Humidity lowering to 25 . So thats going to make this fuel out here even drier and where it could spread even fa
Learning the fire claimed the total of three lives. Two victims identified this morning. Nbc bay area Stephanie Chuang in middletown this morning. You spoke to one of the people who knew one of the victims very well. Reporter she heard early this morning she heard from Sheriff Deputies, but its not getting any easier. Were into day six and people are getting news of the latest death and making this a lot tougher. I want to say we are back in middletown and standing in front of ro sa gonzalezs house, or whats left of it. We met her in the Evacuation Center in calistoga today and yesterday. We said wed come and check it out. You really cant tell what is standing. Just some trucks and foundation and some of the garage. Meanwhile Lake County Office confirmed two bodies around 8 30 last night. A body found presumed to be bruce burns and based on a second location, the sheriff says the other body is expected to be the body of leonard neft. He told his wife saturday afternoon he didnt smell s
Griego. Frank is on assignment. Firefighters made little progress overnight in fighting the massive valley fire. Its now at 70,000 acres. Crews have it 30 contained. So far, 585 homes have been destroyed. But that number is going to rise. One person has died. At least one man is missing. Thats leonard neft. He last spoke to his family saturday as the fire burned close the home. Authorities found his burned out car last night that they think he tried to use to escape. The fire burned close to 100 square miles, thats the area in red. Anne makovec joined an evacuee on their journey home to find what was left. Reporter so many evacuees are in limbo not knowing if their home is standing or not. One by one evacuees are being led back to places like this before they get to their property. Many of them have really no idea what they are going to find. [ crying ] reporter so miss flynn signed up for a Sheriffs Office escort back home. We have to know if we can breeze easier or if we breathe easi