In the midst of fire...

June 3, 2018 fell on a Sunday. Around three that afternoon my husband, Raul, lay napping in the bed and I lay beside him reading a book. We were enjoying a lazy Sunday afternoon and preparing to gear up for the week ahead. I had tried to take a nap, but found myself unable to fall asleep.

When I started hearing the sirens, I barely noticed them. Sirens are a common occurrence here and unlike in the United States, they don’t always signify an emergency vehicle or any type of cause of alarm. (The ice cream man has his own siren here). It was when I started hearing the screams that the noise caught my attention. At first, I thought maybe there was a parade passing in front of our house. Parades here are also very common and it was a Catholic holiday on this day. Except, there was something different about these screams. These screams sounded terrified.

Our rental house is surrounded by a 12-foot concrete wall and one must walk approximately fifty yards across the garden to reach the gate that leads to the road in front of the house. As soon as I walked out the front door of the house, I saw it… a cloud that I still lack the words to adequately describe.

Living and working at the foot of an active volcano, one becomes accustomed to clouds of ash, tremors, explosions, and all sorts of “normal” volcanic activity on almost a daily basis. It is not uncommon for the volcano to shake the homes and buildings nearby or to puff out ash clouds from time to time. However, this cloud was NOT a normal ash cloud.

This dark brown churning cloud sent a chill down to my soul… it reached approximately 5 kilometers into the air, and was bearing down on us with a fury stronger than any southern thunderhead I had seen in my life… however… what was more terrifying was the fact that I could see that this cloud was actually COMING UP from the ground as it FLOWED down the riverbed that is approximately ½ mile from our home. This was not an ash cloud at all. I later learned that this was a pyroclastic flow which is a mixture of superheated gases (up to 1200 degrees Celsius), mud, and volcanic debris that can travel at speeds up to 200mph, can climb hills and riverbanks, and carbonizes any living thing caught in it’s path. I began screaming for Raul.

“Something bad is happening. We need to GO NOW!” I yelled. Raul, waking up from his slumber joined me on the porch and in a very relaxed and calm manner declared that it was JUST an ash cloud and we should just go inside and wait for it to pass over us. I, on the other hand, went into “emergency mode”, grabbed important documents, the dogs, and yelled for Raul to get in the truck. I tried to explain in rather poor Spanish (apparently stress effects my ability to speak Spanish) that this WAS NOT an ash cloud as it was coming UP FROM the ground and that I thought it was lava which was flowing in the riverbed now approximately 500 yards IN FRONT of our house. He must have noticed something in my frantic actions and/or inability to put words together in complete sentences and decided it was best to go along with my crazy plan. This video starts near the entrance to our house: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=21t5Sh1dLg4  

When he opened the large gate to the house, what we saw in the street looked like a scene out of horror film. People filling the street, screaming, running for their lives… running from the giant cloud that was moving ever closer to us with each passing second. The screaming sirens, the sounds of people shouting, people screaming for help… all combined into a web of chaos as I had never previously experienced. As soon as we pulled the truck through the gate and into the road, we were surrounded by people begging for help.. begging for a ride. I yelled… “Get in!!” and people piled in as Raul shut the gate to the house. With approximately 15 people in the bed of the pickup truck, we quickly joined the flood of vehicles and people fleeing away from the quickly descending cloud. All I could think was “Is this real? Is this really happening? When am I going to wake up from this dream?”

We drove past crowds of people running, people begging for rides, and people crying out for help as we put distance in between ourselves and the giant cloud which still seemed to be getting closer to us despite us driving in the opposite direction. The people in the back of the truck were wailing, screaming, and crying out as we slowly moved ahead of the cloud.

When we reached Escuintla (about 8 miles away), we pulled into a McDonalds to let the people out of the pickup. That’s when we realized.. there was a badly burned woman and toddler that had been in the back of the pickup truck. (Graphic description to follow)*** The woman’s flesh was charred black and was peeling off of her arms, face, and chest as she sat propped up against the tailgate shaking and screaming with her arms in the air. Her clothing had melted to her. Her two year old daughter was in a similar state. Their screams filled the air surrounding the truck. ***The other people begged us to take her to the hospital (as if that was even an option in my mind). We immediately agreed to take them to the hospital.

 As we were about to pull off, three young boys who had also been in the truck came running up to the window crying hysterically. They explained that they had run from their home and jumped in the truck to get away. They said that their family, including their mother and siblings, had not fled their home and were still inside. We told them that we would take them to the hospital as well, and find someone to help them there.

Let’s just say that my experience as a police officer once again came in handy as we drove to the hospital in the most “efficient” manner possible. When we pulled into the emergency entrance, the crowd in front of the hospital turned and stared with mouths agape. As we explained to the onlookers, doctors, and nurses what had happened we quickly realized that they had no idea that there had been an eruption at all. We were the first to arrive from the scene of the eruption.

The badly burned young woman and toddler were carried inside, and a team of individuals quickly came to comfort the three young boys who had fled with us in the pickup. The young boys were embraced and reassured that everything would be done to reunite them with their families.  

As silence fell inside the truck, Raul and I just looked at each other… What now? We decided to go to a nearby shopping center and relax for a moment to gather our thoughts.

As we made phone calls and realized that we would NOT be returning to the house anytime soon, our support system of missionaries, friends, and family went into action. We immediately were invited to stay at a friend’s house in San Lucas, we were provided with clothes, toiletries, and basic items (we left with just the clothes on our backs). People rallied around us offering help from all directions. We were initially overwhelmed with the outpouring of support we received.

In front of the house. Volcano Fuego
can be seen over the rooftops. The curve
down the road is where COMPLETE
destruction took place. 

As the days passed, reality hit. There were tears, frustration, and confusion about what the next step should/would be. We did not know if we even had a home to return to. It was not until around the third day that we actually saw the front gate of the house on a newscast and it appeared that there had only been ash in front of the house. I literally jumped up and down screaming “We have a house!! We have a house!!”

We decided early on that we would not be able to return to live in our rental house. We knew that we would be in constant fear of another eruption and for our own safety and well-being we would need to find another home. However, we would try to get our belongings out of the house.

Over the past few weeks, we have been blessed to find a new rental house in a neighborhood about 25 minutes farther away from the volcano (that has access to waterparks!!). We have made three trips (with the help of brave friends) to move items from our previous house to the new house. We still have some things that we have yet to move.

Debris from the lahares following the eruption

The area where our previous rental house is located has been deemed uninhabitable and we have had to be very careful due to lahares (flows of boiling mud, large rocks, and volcanic material) that have also been flowing through the area of the previous house.

So, as I have had time to reflect on all that has happened in the past few weeks, I have asked God to show me where he was in the midst of the fire.. where was He when we were running for our lives from our house? Where was He when there was a burned woman and baby in the back of the truck? Where was He?

….and… He has shown me.. HE was right there with us… He showed me that HE used us to save the lives of that young woman and her toddler… He showed me that we were His hands for those we carried with us in the back of the truck... He is the one who kept me from falling asleep so that I would hear the sirens and screams and that we would be able to flee in time… He has been with us as our friends have been His hands and feet providing us clothes, toiletries, and a place to stay… and He CONTINUES to be with us as we return to a “new normal” of life. Even in the midst of the fire… GOD IS WITH US.

As we navigate the next few weeks, we continue to be ever so grateful for our support system, our friends, our families, and all of those who have reached out and prayed for us. THANK YOU. Thank you for your generosity, for reaching out to help, for being there to listen, and just for being good to us.  THANK YOU.

Blessings,

Meaghen