Red Leader
Well-known member
Dear friends and fellow Garage Journal members,
As some of you may have known, we have had wildfires sweeping through Colorado nearly the entire month of June. We (our local tool/garage group w/ several GJ'ers) recently were informed that on June 11 a friend and fellow GJ'er had to evacuate his home in Black Forest, CO, along with his family and animals due to a fire that had just started.
Here is one of the first articles on the fire:
http://www.9news.com/rss/story.aspx?storyid=340545
The number homes destroyed kept rising. The day after he informed us, the fire had claimed about 50 structures. A day after that, and the toll had risen to 379.
On June 13, just two days later, we received the disheartening news from him that with visual confirmation of his housing block, his entire property had been destroyed by the fire for a total loss. This includes his house, his garage/shop, and a brand new barn that he had just finished getting the sheetrock up in.
As it stands, with over 500 structures lost, the Black Forest Fire is the #1 most destructive fire in Colorado history.
If you are interested in learning more about the fire, this is a good info page:
http://inciweb.org/incident/3424/
We have been in constant communication with him and he and his family are safe and have a roof over their heads. We have organized a work party to head out there this coming Saturday and help him sift through the ash and start organizing things. I will take some additional pictures and try to update this thread as appropriate.
Once he was allowed back in (just this past weekend) He sent us some updates with some pictures. I have his permission/approval to post them -
The house:
The barn (just built):
The shop:
I was down at his place a while back when he helped me seat the arbor bearing for a vintage Atlas table saw that I was working on and got to take a tour of his shop and take some pictures. These photos were posted to my GJ thread. The before/after is pretty hard-hitting. The 'before' shots are the actual tools.
More garage pictures:
If you notice, the badge on the Walker Turner band saw is missing - everything that was not solid steel or iron melted. It was a very hot fire. At this point little to nothing may be salvageable. We'll see once we get down there on Saturday and start combing through everything. Right now, they have been working through the insurance situation. As you can see, he had a lot of very nice garage equipment, and it is hard to say how the insurance will pan out, especially on vintage equipment.
They are doing okay, but please keep him and his family in your thoughts any prayers. They could really use some encouragement, positive thoughts, anything else you could think of that would help you if you were in his situation. Please feel free to post any of the above in this thread and I will be sharing it with him.
More updates to come.
As some of you may have known, we have had wildfires sweeping through Colorado nearly the entire month of June. We (our local tool/garage group w/ several GJ'ers) recently were informed that on June 11 a friend and fellow GJ'er had to evacuate his home in Black Forest, CO, along with his family and animals due to a fire that had just started.
Here is one of the first articles on the fire:
http://www.9news.com/rss/story.aspx?storyid=340545
The number homes destroyed kept rising. The day after he informed us, the fire had claimed about 50 structures. A day after that, and the toll had risen to 379.
On June 13, just two days later, we received the disheartening news from him that with visual confirmation of his housing block, his entire property had been destroyed by the fire for a total loss. This includes his house, his garage/shop, and a brand new barn that he had just finished getting the sheetrock up in.
As it stands, with over 500 structures lost, the Black Forest Fire is the #1 most destructive fire in Colorado history.
If you are interested in learning more about the fire, this is a good info page:
http://inciweb.org/incident/3424/
We have been in constant communication with him and he and his family are safe and have a roof over their heads. We have organized a work party to head out there this coming Saturday and help him sift through the ash and start organizing things. I will take some additional pictures and try to update this thread as appropriate.
Once he was allowed back in (just this past weekend) He sent us some updates with some pictures. I have his permission/approval to post them -
The house:
The barn (just built):
The shop:
I was down at his place a while back when he helped me seat the arbor bearing for a vintage Atlas table saw that I was working on and got to take a tour of his shop and take some pictures. These photos were posted to my GJ thread. The before/after is pretty hard-hitting. The 'before' shots are the actual tools.
More garage pictures:
If you notice, the badge on the Walker Turner band saw is missing - everything that was not solid steel or iron melted. It was a very hot fire. At this point little to nothing may be salvageable. We'll see once we get down there on Saturday and start combing through everything. Right now, they have been working through the insurance situation. As you can see, he had a lot of very nice garage equipment, and it is hard to say how the insurance will pan out, especially on vintage equipment.
They are doing okay, but please keep him and his family in your thoughts any prayers. They could really use some encouragement, positive thoughts, anything else you could think of that would help you if you were in his situation. Please feel free to post any of the above in this thread and I will be sharing it with him.
More updates to come.
