By the time I was showered and dressed and heading down the street the town was alive. I met my Pentacostal and Presbyterian colleagues at the Presbyterian church. They decided to head off to Dairy Queen to get coffee for the firefighters. I went around the corner to the street full of firefighting equipment - trucks from Canyon/Lister and Wynndel as well as Creston. Down at the end of the block the Royalcrest Apartments were burning - at least, the top floor was. Next door was Swan Valley Lodge with its 50 or so elderly residents, most with real difficulty getting around. And Royalcrest's inhabitants are mostly seniors, too.
Swan Valley Lodge is next door, on our side of the fire. Almost 50 elderly people had to be evacuated from there.
I checked at Swan Valley to see if there was anything they needed me to do. They said most of the residents had already been evacuated to the other long-term care facility, the hospital or the town's recreation centre. I went to the rec centre to see if anyone needed a hug. The Emergency Services machinery was already humming. They were finding out who lived in Royalcrest, if they were in town or away, and were checking them off as they turned up. The bylaw control officer found one of them wandering around the street looking dazed and brought him in. Within an hour everyone was accounted for. The Swan Valley residents who didn't need much care started arriving by handi-van and got checked in, too. At first they were just warehoused in the main room, which was cold and drafty and noisy and dark.
Later someone found a smaller, warmer, cheerful and sunny room to put them. They were enjoying themselves greatly for the most part. Every couple of minutes another volunteer would show up and ask them if they wanted coffee or tea or a donut, and all their old neighbours and friends were turning up to check on them.
Most impressive: the Emergency Services people were equipped to help people replace their medications, glasses, clothes, whatever, and were tracking down places for them to stay. They'd even brought in someone from the insurance agency to help people get their claims started.
This was the first time the town's emergency response plan had been tested. The only thing that had been forgotten: commodes and lifting equipment for the elderly ones who couldn't use regular washrooms. And after lunch the elderly needed to lie down for naps - the motels and hotels produced rafts of cots for them to use.
Not bad for a little place.
