Living With Fire: Big Sur is an ongoing series of conversations about the Timber and Plaskett Fires—and, more broadly, about what it means to live with wildfire in Big Sur.

In this episode I talk with Lucas Handy of Treebones Resort, on the South Coast of Big Sur.

Longtime listeners may remember that Lucas's parents, John and Corinne Handy, have both been guests on A Big Sur Podcast, talking about Treebones—the remarkable place they created on the South Coast and the family and community that grew around it. Lucas was thirteen when the family moved there. Big Sur has been home ever since.

Lucas's experience of the recent fires is unusual because he found himself in the middle of both.

When the Timber Fire began, he returned to Big Sur and joined friends and neighbors around Partington Ridge, helping with clearing, supplies and preparations while also documenting what was happening with his camera. Then he came home to the South Coast.

Five days later, the Plaskett Fire started.

This time the fire was in his own neighborhood.

Lucas takes us onto Willow Creek and Los Burros roads and describes the uncertainty of those first hours, the work of neighbors, the arrival—and sometimes absence—of professional resources, the shortage of water, and a back-burn operation that suddenly became something much more dangerous.

At one point Lucas and a friend found themselves trying to leave a property as fire crossed their only way out. They eventually drove through flames to escape. It is quite a story.

But this conversation isn't primarily about heroics. It's about judgment, local knowledge, responsibility, and community. When should we, the residents, stay and help? When are we simply putting ourselves and firefighters in greater danger? What do we know that an arriving fire crew cannot know? And what do professional firefighters understand that even experienced residents may not? And who are 'we' to decide?

We also talk about Treebones itself. Guests were evacuated, reservations cancelled, and the resort became an impromptu support center for firefighters—food, showers, a place to sleep, and, importantly, water.

Toward the end of our conversation Lucas says something that may be at the heart of this entire series. Driving through the burned landscape afterward, what overwhelmed him wasn't simply fear or relief. It was pride in the way this community had come together.

And he talks movingly about his late brother Mike Handy, who had been a captain with Big Sur Fire, and the feeling that in doing this work he was, in some small way, carrying his brother with him.

This is the second conversation in Living With Fire: Big Sur. More voices will follow—residents, scientists, public officials, firefighters, communicators and others trying to understand what happened during these fires, what worked, what didn't, and what Big Sur might learn before the next one.

All comments much welcomed!

Support the show

_________________________________________________


This podcast is a production of the Henry Miller Memorial Library with support from The Arts Council for Monterey County!

Let us know what you think!
SEND US AN EMAIL!  😊
magnus@henrymiller.org

FaceBook
Instagram