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CNN Live Sunday

Interview With Evacuated Homeowners

Aired October 26, 2003 - 11:22   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


HEIDI COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: More now on the fires in southern California. A blaze dubbed the Grand Prix is racing through acres of land, leaving destroyed homes and lives in its path. CNN's Miguel Marquez is live from Laverne now with the very latest.
Miguel, last time we checked in with you, you said you guys were in Laverne because you're trying to stay ahead of the flames. How are things looking now?

MIGUEL MARQUEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, it seems that so far we seem to be staying ahead of the flames. It's very hard to keep track of all the fires out here because there do seem to be so many of them. The fire is burning right behind us in the San Gabriel Mountains, right there, now the Angeles national forest. In Claremont, here in California, 50 homes, we are told, have burned and thousands of people are evacuated.

I'm joined by a few of those people who have been evacuated. The Bjornsen family, Tiny Bjornsen right here, the most important person in the family, Jarret, Brett and Greg Bjornsen.

Jarret, how did this work? What time -- how did you guys know it was coming? What happened this morning?

JARRET BJORNSEN, EVACUATED HOMEOWNER: Well, about 3:30 we heard the sirens. By 4:00 they were telling us to get out. We had started taking pictures off the walls when we got up, clearing stuff out of the safe.

MARQUEZ: How does it come? Somebody on a loudspeaker outside, a knock at the door?

BJORNSEN: Loudspeaker.

MARQUEZ: How much time did you have?

BJORNSEN: Maybe an hour.

GREG BJORNSEN, EVACUATED HOMEOWNER: About a half hour, hour.

JARRET BJORNSEN: Yes.

MARQUEZ: You decided to take what in that time?

BRETT BJORNSEN: The first thing I took was bean dip.

MARQUEZ: Bean dip? Why bean dip?

BRETT BJORNSEN: Didn't want to waste it. Second thing I took was the bible.

GREG BJORNSEN: Yes, pictures, valuables, things like that.

JARRET BJORNSEN: Some clothes.

GREG BJORNSEN: You really don't know what to think about and just grab what you think can't be replaced.

MARQUEZ: What were you seeing coming in at that point?

JARRET BJORNSEN: A lot of smoke. Flames over the ridge.

BRETT BJORNSEN: Looked like lava was coming out.

JARRET BJORNSEN: The sky was glowing.

MARQUEZ: We're at a city park here in Laverne, but where is your house from where we're standing? Back up that way over Esperanza.

MARQUEZ: About a mile away.

JARRET BJORNSEN: Yes.

MARQUEZ: Did you expect it to get here?

JARRET BJORNSEN: No.

BRETT BJORNSEN: No.

JARRET BJORNSEN: Not at all.

MARQUEZ: OK. One other thing I want to tell you guys about is this is not the only fire here. There's a fire east of here. There's also a fire north of here. We have some new information on the Simi fire. 60,000 acres it has burned. It is apparently out of control and they are evacuating thousands of people from that area, as well. We understand 12 homes so far have been destroyed in that fire.

I want to thank the Bjornsens for joining us today and very good luck to you guys. Heidi, back to you.

COLLINS: Good luck to them from us, as well. Thanks so much, Miguel Marquez, coming to us from Laverne.

We're going to toss things over to Rob Marciano now, our meteorologist who has been watching these fires as well. We've been talking all morning about how fast they're moving.

ROB MARCIANO, CNN METEOROLOGIST: You have winds that are blowing close to 40 miles an hour; that's certainly pushes them along. That's pretty much it. Santa Ana winds continue to blow. The setup remains the same. It's not going to be any better today than it was yesterday. If anything, some of the pressure gradients that's setting up will probably make it a little worse, with warm winds gusting at times 30 to 50 miles an hour, already seeing wind gusts 40 miles an hour across a lot of the valley locations here in So Cal. So it is happening and will happen for the next 12 hours. Wind advisories are up. It will decrease somewhat tomorrow as the trough offshore begins to weaken, and then Tuesday we'll look for it to diminish. But today is looking nasty.

We do have live picture, one of the by-products of what can happen when you get smoke and fire. This is a live shot from Claremont. You can see the sun rising. Kind of hazy, and it gives you that red tinge. All that smoke and pollution in the atmosphere makes it look pretty. So there is a good byproduct, I suppose, if we can see a silver lining.

COLLINS: Wow. I've never seen anything like that. Rob Marciano, thanks so much.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com







Aired October 26, 2003 - 11:22   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
HEIDI COLLINS, CNN ANCHOR: More now on the fires in southern California. A blaze dubbed the Grand Prix is racing through acres of land, leaving destroyed homes and lives in its path. CNN's Miguel Marquez is live from Laverne now with the very latest.
Miguel, last time we checked in with you, you said you guys were in Laverne because you're trying to stay ahead of the flames. How are things looking now?

MIGUEL MARQUEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, it seems that so far we seem to be staying ahead of the flames. It's very hard to keep track of all the fires out here because there do seem to be so many of them. The fire is burning right behind us in the San Gabriel Mountains, right there, now the Angeles national forest. In Claremont, here in California, 50 homes, we are told, have burned and thousands of people are evacuated.

I'm joined by a few of those people who have been evacuated. The Bjornsen family, Tiny Bjornsen right here, the most important person in the family, Jarret, Brett and Greg Bjornsen.

Jarret, how did this work? What time -- how did you guys know it was coming? What happened this morning?

JARRET BJORNSEN, EVACUATED HOMEOWNER: Well, about 3:30 we heard the sirens. By 4:00 they were telling us to get out. We had started taking pictures off the walls when we got up, clearing stuff out of the safe.

MARQUEZ: How does it come? Somebody on a loudspeaker outside, a knock at the door?

BJORNSEN: Loudspeaker.

MARQUEZ: How much time did you have?

BJORNSEN: Maybe an hour.

GREG BJORNSEN, EVACUATED HOMEOWNER: About a half hour, hour.

JARRET BJORNSEN: Yes.

MARQUEZ: You decided to take what in that time?

BRETT BJORNSEN: The first thing I took was bean dip.

MARQUEZ: Bean dip? Why bean dip?

BRETT BJORNSEN: Didn't want to waste it. Second thing I took was the bible.

GREG BJORNSEN: Yes, pictures, valuables, things like that.

JARRET BJORNSEN: Some clothes.

GREG BJORNSEN: You really don't know what to think about and just grab what you think can't be replaced.

MARQUEZ: What were you seeing coming in at that point?

JARRET BJORNSEN: A lot of smoke. Flames over the ridge.

BRETT BJORNSEN: Looked like lava was coming out.

JARRET BJORNSEN: The sky was glowing.

MARQUEZ: We're at a city park here in Laverne, but where is your house from where we're standing? Back up that way over Esperanza.

MARQUEZ: About a mile away.

JARRET BJORNSEN: Yes.

MARQUEZ: Did you expect it to get here?

JARRET BJORNSEN: No.

BRETT BJORNSEN: No.

JARRET BJORNSEN: Not at all.

MARQUEZ: OK. One other thing I want to tell you guys about is this is not the only fire here. There's a fire east of here. There's also a fire north of here. We have some new information on the Simi fire. 60,000 acres it has burned. It is apparently out of control and they are evacuating thousands of people from that area, as well. We understand 12 homes so far have been destroyed in that fire.

I want to thank the Bjornsens for joining us today and very good luck to you guys. Heidi, back to you.

COLLINS: Good luck to them from us, as well. Thanks so much, Miguel Marquez, coming to us from Laverne.

We're going to toss things over to Rob Marciano now, our meteorologist who has been watching these fires as well. We've been talking all morning about how fast they're moving.

ROB MARCIANO, CNN METEOROLOGIST: You have winds that are blowing close to 40 miles an hour; that's certainly pushes them along. That's pretty much it. Santa Ana winds continue to blow. The setup remains the same. It's not going to be any better today than it was yesterday. If anything, some of the pressure gradients that's setting up will probably make it a little worse, with warm winds gusting at times 30 to 50 miles an hour, already seeing wind gusts 40 miles an hour across a lot of the valley locations here in So Cal. So it is happening and will happen for the next 12 hours. Wind advisories are up. It will decrease somewhat tomorrow as the trough offshore begins to weaken, and then Tuesday we'll look for it to diminish. But today is looking nasty.

We do have live picture, one of the by-products of what can happen when you get smoke and fire. This is a live shot from Claremont. You can see the sun rising. Kind of hazy, and it gives you that red tinge. All that smoke and pollution in the atmosphere makes it look pretty. So there is a good byproduct, I suppose, if we can see a silver lining.

COLLINS: Wow. I've never seen anything like that. Rob Marciano, thanks so much.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com