“The flames were coming across the street. When you see it coming toward you like boiling water, it’s terrifying.”
Laura Yates will never forget the intensity with which the wildfire spread March 22. She lives on Lolly Way, which is on the west side of County Road 121. She watched the flames dance across the roadway, headed toward her land.
“It was terrifying,” Yates said. “I really didn’t know what to do. I had no water to put anything out. The power was out.”
Her neighbor didn’t have any transportation at her home and ran to Yates, crossing a grassy area that houses a donkey and pigs between their two homes. They, along with Yates’ 8-year-old son, gathered their dogs and jumped in the car. The only material possession Yates grabbed from inside her home was her asthmatic son’s nebulizer.
She fled to her mother’s home on Cortez Road, but returned to the home around 2:40 a.m., seeing “just a bunch of smoke pretty much and little fires all over the place.”
Yates described the wildfire as something you only expect to see in a movie.
“To actually be in the middle of this was unreal,” she said. “I grew up here and I’ve spent my whole life here.”
She calmly fed the donkey and pigs Thursday afternoon. Just 24 hours earlier, she let them out of their pens, unsure she’d ever see them alive again.
Scrolling through pictures on her phone, she showed the Record how flames ignited the perimeter of the acreage behind her home, dancing around the animals’ pens around 4:30 p.m. March 22. When she returned to her home early March 23, she didn’t know if she’d find them alive, but she was able to return them all to their cages.
Yates pointed out the piles of dirt where firefighters created fire breaks around her home.
“The fire department was amazing,” she said. “They dug a big ditch all the way around my house and what they did saved my house.”
Other Bryceville residents were not as fortunate.
Homes at 1504 and 1710 County Road 119 burned down to the cinder blocks holding the frames. One of those homes was occupied by Paul Megois and his family.
Megois wasn’t home at the time of the fire, but his family members said officers came to their home and told them they needed to pack up and leave. At that time, the fire was closing in on their home.
“They were trying to grab things,” Megois said. “He came back and pretty much said, ‘Run.’”
By the time they and their three dogs were in the car, a Ford F-150 at the side of the house was on fire and flames were climbing up the side of the home.
Another truck on the property was damaged by the heat, but not touched by flames. The family had gone to Yulee earlier in the day to adopt a beagle from Nassau County Animal Control. A nail to the tire caused a slow leak. When they were escaping the fire, they saw the flat tire and had to leave the truck behind.
Also left behind was General, the family’s cat. He was believed to be outside of the home when the fire began.
“He’s a homebody, but the flames were everywhere, so no telling where he went,” Megois said. “We called him General because he thought he was the boss.”
The cat has long hair and is orange with white striping. Megois hopes to find him.
The fire is another in a string of unfortunate events for his family. His son Dalton injured his fingers while cleaning a gun Feb. 13. The road to recovery includes weekly trips to Bradenton and Dalton’s missed at least six weeks of school. The family was at West Nassau High School Monday, switching him to homebound studies since he already lost so much time and will stay with family in Jacksonville until their home can be rebuilt.
“I’d like to know what bad karma I did to somebody,” Megois said.
Although his family lost their home, he knows it was an accident that could happened to nearly any Bryceville resident.
“I burn trash too,” he said. “I would like to meet the guy. I have no animosity toward him.”
“I lost my house, my shed, my barn and my truck, but my burn pile survived,” he added. “That’s irony right there.”
Megois is thankful that his week is full of insurance adjusters and rebuilding rather than funeral arrangements.
“It could have been a lot worse,” he said. “Although we lost our home, the firefighters saved a lot of others.”
He’s been amazed by the outpouring of donations and offers of help from friends, family and complete strangers from all over.
“The support of the community is absolutely overwhelming,” he said. “We are seeing the beauty of grace through what has come back to us.”
Ashlee Hutto Whiddon and her family lost their home due to the extensive damage. They, too, have seen how strong a community is when it stands together.
“I can’t even begin to think or know how I will ever thank or repay everyone who has called, texted, stopped by and shown love and support to our family through giving, helping, sharing and working to help us start over,” Whiddon posted on her Facebook page. “We know we serve a big God who will get us through this. Are we hurting? Every day, but our faith was not burned; only our home. To our Bryceville community, all the firefighters, first responders, coworkers, friends and family, thank you 100 times plus. Without you we would not be pushing through.”
Whiddon and Megois, among others affected, have received an outpouring of support and offers of help since the fire.
Bryceville First Baptist Church has received a vast array of donations for fire victims. More than 1,000 clothing items were accepted, along with food and water while the church served as a shelter for displaced residents after homes were evacuated.
A church spokesperson said Tuesday that while clothing is no longer needed, the church will continue to accept monetary and gift card donations to help the families as they fix the damage or construct new homes. Donations may be brought to the church or mailed to the church at P.O. Box 2, Bryceville, FL 32009.