Locals in the Kamas Valley are showing their appreciation for the firefighters keeping the nearby blaze at bay.
In what Yellow Lake Fire public information officer Jeff Armstrong calls an “outpouring” of community support, residents spontaneously coordinated laundry and food service.
He was one of the firefighters who got some clean clothes.
“And ended up getting a text message, ‘Hey, it's dropped back off at base camp.’ There was a note from one of their little little kids in there. You know—won't lie—it got me in the feels,” he told KPCW. “It was kind of neat to see that level of support, and I haven't really seen that in a lot of communities.”
Woodland resident Raychel Hatch said it all started when a firefighter asked the community if there was a laundromat around on Facebook. The usual wildland mobile laundry service wasn’t around at first.
“After a sleepless night thinking about it—our business is directly across the street from their base camp—and I was like, ‘I'll just organize it.’ I don't have time to do all the laundry, but our location is just the perfect location,” she said.
So Frontier Woodworks has doubled as a dry cleaner of sorts.
“We all packed for seven or 14 days, and we don't expect to do laundry,” Armstrong said. “But the community came up big.”
Hatch said at least 40 families have reached out to participate, and they’ve done more than 30 loads.
She said that’s fewer loads than she expected—more than 700 personnel were working the fire as of Oct. 17. But not every fighter needs a fresh set, fire information officer Deanna Younger said at a recent community meeting in Kamas.
“You might have seen some hot shots out at a gas station or somewhere and—even if they have laundry—they choose not to use it. So they have it available,” she said Oct. 13. “But that's just the culture.”
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The nonprofit coffee shop Lucky Ones is another business firefighters are frequenting. Co-founder Taylor Matkins said they began accepting donations at both their Park City and Kamas locations this week.
Patrons can buy a firefighter a coffee, pastry or a sandwich. There's a pin-up board with vouchers the fire personnel can grab at the Kamas Lucky Ones.
“We've had a lot of interaction with customers coming in and paying it forward. So we're so grateful,” Matkins said. “The community is really rallying around and trying to do whatever they can.”
Before the rain and snow Oct. 17, the Yellow Lake Fire reached 33,000 acres at 30% containment.
Now that the weather’s on their side, fire crews are hauling some of their equipment out, Armstrong said. He’s not calling it a season yet, but it may signal the beginning of the end of this wildfire.
