Sept. 15--Barbara McWilliams walked very slowly because of advanced multiple sclerosis. But her caretaker recalled Monday, that allowed the former special education teacher to use her "eagle eye" to take in the world's majesty.
The 72-year-old woman, who had no vehicle and could not have driven one, died in her Lake County home on Cobb Mountain over the weekend, becoming the first reported fatality of the fast-moving Valley fire and raising questions about evacuation efforts.
The Sheriff's Department issued a statement saying that deputies responded to the area 22 minutes after receiving a 7:12 p.m. call about her Saturday but were unable to reach the Hot Springs Road home because the subdivision "had already been engulfed by flames."
Jennifer Hittson, 30, who had worked for McWilliams for the past five months -- cleaning the home on a remote wooded property, cutting McWilliams' hair, chopping her vegetables -- tells a different story.
It is one of growing frustration and despair as she begged officials to go get the woman she had come to admire greatly, but was told by both deputies and Cal Fire officials that they did not have the time to assist.
"More should have been done," Hittson, of Kelseyville, said Monday. "She was disabled. I knew she was in the house. She didn't have family or friends [nearby]. If they had just listened to me better..."
McWilliams had spent years in India. She was a practicing Buddhist who insisted on an immaculate home, one free of chemicals, Hittson said. She had spent her career working with children with dyslexia but in her retirement, her health failing, she adored feeding the birds near her home, where an enormous redwood was among the many trees that made the sky a tiny window.
"She had a zest for life. She loved the outdoors," Hittson said.
On Saturday, Hittson was at the home and noticed smoke shortly before leaving at 3 p.m. but it seemed so distant that she thought it was coming from the Butte fire far to the east.
As she drove home, she reached a road block and was told only residents could go through but no one mentioned evacuations to her. She had forgotten her phone and could not check the Internet. By the time she took the long way home she "realized it was getting serious."
She called McWilliams, who told her she had declined an offer to go with a neighbor to find out more, telling her she's just leave with her when she returned with more information. The power had gone out.
Hittson assured her she'd get sheriff's deputies out there.
McWilliams was upbeat, saying she would probably stay at the shelter in the Napa County Fairgrounds in Calistoga.
When Hittson called -- at 6:30 pm -- she was told by a dispatcher that they would try. Her next effort to check on McWilliams failed because the phone lines were down. She called the Sheriff's Department back again at 10 p.m. and says she was told they were "too busy" with general evacuations.
"I just started crying," she said.
Then she learned she could call Cal Fire. She was told to check back in 30 minutes and when she did, at about 11:30 p.m., she was told they had been unable to get up to McWilliams' home. Still, she was assured that the fire did not appear to have reached the street.
She tried again Sunday morning and "they still weren't sure if she had been rescued."
Efforts by Hittson to reach the home herself were thwarted by roadblocks after a two-hour misadventure. Hittson took her plea to Facebook, seeking help from anyone who might know of a backroad in from Mendocino County.
Kristy Ornellas, 28, a former paramedic, tried. In her truck with help from other medically-trained residents, she hauled four others out in hospital beds or wheelchairs in the bed of her pickup, delivering them to the Kelseyville Red Cross shelter for ambulance pickup. But McWilliams long driveway was blocked by debris, she said.
Then McWilliams' daughter, who lives in the Bay Area, reached a neighbor who said the home had burned to the ground.
By Sunday night, confirmation came. McWilliams' remains had been found.
Lake County Sheriff Brian Martin said in a brief interview at a mobile command post Monday that "the fire spread too violently and too quickly for us to be able to get to her on time."
Hittson has been torn by grief and regret. "I could have made her get in my car," she said.
Their last exchange stays with her.
Just before she left on Saturday, McWilliams told her "turn around and look at me."
"I just want to tell you," she said, "how much I enjoy you, how much I appreciate you."
UPDATED
4:35 pm: Updated throughout with new information.
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