The 3rd and last day of ash sifting was mostly spent cataloging and rescuing items. Today we did go back into the house for a few specific items, and found them. One was my current journal, which was half-burned but with some legible poems. Another was boxes and boxes of photos. It seems Doug and I spent about 5 straight hours today peeling stuck photos and laying them out to dry:
The 2nd Day of sifting through the ashes of our former home consisted of a number of targeted searches. We recalled precious items, tried to remember where we last saw them, and then went in and tried to find if they were in one piece or not. Most were not.
We also spent a good portion of the day cataloging. Every. Single. Thing. In rooms where items are recognizable we’re writing down the make/model of each item, even to the point of recording individual forks or screwdrivers. In rooms where items are beyond recognition, we’re going from memory. This exhaustive and faulty process will no doubt result in some missed items, but it’s the only way we can quantify what we lost for the insurance company.
Our lovely friend Clay Good setup a tarp garage on our property, so we now have a dry place to put rescued items, as well as sort, clean, and determine if anything needs to go back in the house.
It feels weird throwing things deemed garbage *back* into the house.
For me, the greatest find of the first day of ash-sifting was my Makita lithium ion screw gun. I loved this tool more than any other for it’s light weight, small size, and big power. That drill and I had a lot of good times in the pink house.
Colin and I found it fused to a number of other tools. We had to use a prybar to free it but were able to get it off in one piece:
The reason this find was so inspiring to me, is that the drill still worked! Check this out:
Today we began sifting through the ashes of our house, trying to find various precious and irreplaceable items.
One such item, which many passers-by of the pink house often commented on, was the pig weather vein. He wasn’t on the roof, but we found him in the kitchen. He’s a bit worse for wear, but if we rebuild the pink house he’ll adorn it’s roof once again.
We were also fortunate enough to find a few of Laura’s precious earings, a small stone carving, and one of Laura’s grandma’s heirloom pitchers. The ceramic pitcher is blackened, but was unbelievably unbroken under a pile of rubble in the kitchen.
Today we move from the wonderful Rainforest Cottage on Basin Road to the Baranof hotel. We’ve lived on Basin Road since 2003 and are very sad to be leaving it. Especially since the future is so uncertain and we’re not sure when we’ll be back. 
Luckily, on Monday we get to move into a new house which we’ve already signed a lease on. Meadow is excited because it’s yellow. Not as cool of a color as pink, but pretty cool nevertheless!
The local paper ran an article this morning, following-up on the arson. When they asked me how it felt when I found out it was arson I was quoted saying:
“It felt like someone punched me in the stomach”
We woke up this morning to quite a surprise. The fire department reports that the fire in our neighbor’s basement was started intentionally.
I was so shocked when I first read this, because it never crossed my mind. An accident I can swallow. But someone intentionally setting a fire that results in the total loss of my home is beyond appalling.
What’s more frightening is the fact the window from which I smelled and originally saw the fire is my daughter’s. Luckily, she was sleeping in our bed at the time, but had she been in her own bed with the door closed and window open, things may have turned out a lot differently.
We’re so grateful to have each other, and so sickened by how close we came to losing something really important.
I sincerely hope whomever set this fire comes forward to accept responsibility, so they can clear their conscience, receive their due consequence, and so we can learn the answer to the burning question: WHY.
Today the newspaper ran an article about our hero Ezra and the lemon “aide” stand he organized to raise money for the pink house. He and the other neighborhood kids are so excited about how much money they’ve been making. $2,500 so far and counting!
They were overjoyed and telling us that by the end of the week they planned to make over One Million Dollars. Here’s Ezra (on the right) telling us how much money he’s raising for us:
Today I was interviewed by KTOO radio.
After the fire I was emotionally numb. It’s shocking to stand there and watch everything you’ve collected all your life, and worked on, burn to ashes in a matter of hours. My logical brain took over and feelings were suppressed.
Until 9yo Ezra from two doors down showed me the lemon “aide” sign he’d made. He plans to sell lemonade to help us raise money to rebuild.
The sign is about six feet by six feet, and when he showed it to me I melted.
Originally the amount was .50c but then he raised it to $2.50. So if you want to help us rebuild, go buy a cup of lemonade from Ezra!
Here’s an article in the paper about his Lemon “Aide” stand.
I called our insurance company shortly after the fire to get the ball rolling. After navigating the automated voice recognition telephone tree I finally landed with the person who introduced herself as our primary claim adjuster. She described the overall scenario to me, and let me know the names of the other Allstate adjusters we’d be working with. There are three in total:
- Adjuster for the Dwelling
- Adjuster for Contents
- Adjuster for Additional Expenses
Our policy includes additional expenses outside what we pay regularly to live. So while we’re still paying our mortgage, they’ll cover the cost to rent a place for up to twelve months.
Our dwelling is covered for a specific amount, which is the amount the house appraised at in 2005. I’ve heard tale of another type of coverage, which covers the rebuild cost, whatever that may be, but our house was never eligible for that since it’s over 100 years old.
Unfortunately the amount our dwelling is insured for is no where close to the cost to build a house from scratch in Juneau, where $/sq ft costs are very high.
Allstate has been pretty good so far, although we’ve found they are not forthcoming about what they owe us. This was expected, although after you’ve watched your house and all precious belongings turn into ash, it’s a cold slap in the face to have to deal with such an unfeeling bureaucracy. Even the individuals we’re working with, we can tell, are desensitized from dealing with it so often. More than a few times we found our adjuster’s lighthearted attitudes inappropriate. Advice to insurance adjusters: when you’re talking to a family that just lost their home and just found out they’re under insured, don’t tell them about the all inclusive policy you have on your own home and the vacation you’re about to take so you can build a new deck.
So after meeting with our dwelling adjuster, we’re encouraged we’ll get the maximum our policy offers us, but thoroughly depressed about that amount being so much lower than what it will actually cost to rebuild the pink house.
This morning the Juneau Empire ran this article: Fire consumes family’s Basin Road home.
I was heading to bed at about 1AM on June 1st when I heard what sounded like the cat scratching at the door to get in. When I went out to the living room to get her, I discovered the sound was instead coming from the open window of my Daughter’s room, which faces our neighbor’s house. I smelled smoke. When I looked out the window I could clearly see in the neighbor’s basement window a hazy orange glow.
I threw some clothes on and went outside. There was definitely a fire in the neighbors basement. I banged on their door to let them know, then called 911. They grabbed fire extinguishers and my wife and I grabbed our hose. As I was spraying water into the neighbor’s basement, all I could see was an angry orange cloud. The water seemed to have no effect.
The basement window broke and flames leaped from it, tickling the edge of my house, at which point I dropped the hose and proceeded to remove some belongings from our house. I was able to retrieve:
- my and Bill’s acoustic guitars
- wife’s jewelry box
- USB disk with recent backup of our family video and photos
- camera
- fortunately my wallet, car keys, and iPhone were in the pocket of the shorts I happened to put on.
We then proceeded to stand in the parking lot across the street and watch our home burn to a total loss.
I was in shock, and the only thing I could do was send out a few tweets beginning with this one:
We stood outside all morning. By 2AM it was clear our entire attic and roof were on fire. By 4AM it was clear the house was a total loss. Since I had my camera, I was able to take some video:
and pictures: