VENTURA, California: For a brief time, Bob Pazen thought he had been one of the lucky ones, a man whose house had somehow escaped the ferocious wind-driven fires that destroyed at least 150 other structures in his hillside neighborhood overlooking this picturesque beachfront town.
Pazen, his wife, son and their dog had fled just ahead of the raging flames Monday night, and when he returned Tuesday morning he was delighted to see their home still standing.
But after leaving to move the cars he’d left behind the night before, Pazen returned later Tuesday to discover the blaze had doubled back.
“The house was totally engulfed in flames,” he said.
His story was just one of many illustrating the unpredictability of the flames that had hop-scotched downhill toward the Pacific Ocean on Monday and Tuesday with devastating effect, destroying homes seemingly at random while leaving others untouched.
Pazen had been sleeping when his son awakened him, shouting, “Hey, get out of bed and let’s go.”
John Terrones was also asleep when he heard a noise outside about the same time his phone began to ring. It was his son calling to warn him a wildfire was heading right toward him.
“I went outside and looked, and I saw the flames coming over the hill,” he said.
He and his wife loaded their five dogs, some cash, jewelry and a few other items into their car and fled. From a safe distance, he watched as his neighbor’s house went up in flames while his was spared.
“I just watched it burn, burn, burn,” he said. “It got almost to our backyard. We got very lucky.”
David Rensin was another of the lucky ones.
He’d stepped outside to check on things about an hour after the winds had knocked out power throughout his neighborhood. When he saw flames illuminating the full moon bright red he decided it was time to leave.
Rensin, his wife and their cat spent a night in their car at an evacuation center at Ventura’s beachside county fairgrounds. As he looked up the hill at his neighborhood he was fairly certain his home was gone. He was grateful to find it untouched the next day.
Two blocks away the three-story Hawaiian Village apartment complex had burned to the ground.
John and Linda Keasler had just enough time to grab an envelope with their passports and flee their first-floor apartment, leaving one of their two cars behind. They returned the next day to discover that the fire that reduced their entire 52-unit apartment complex to a smoldering pile of rubble had somehow spared their other car.
She and her husband have lived in Ventura for two years, and they say they hope to remain in the city of 110,000 people 60 miles northwest of Los Angeles. With its white sandy beaches and funky old downtown, it’s one of California’s best-kept beautiful secrets.
Although disappointed she didn’t think to grab two boxes containing childhood photos of her adult sons as she headed out the door, Keasler added there was nothing else in the couple’s apartment that can’t be replaced.
“Those things we can always get back,” she said. “The truth is it’s just things, it’s just things, and thank God no one died.”“
Pazen was similarly philosophical.
“We’re alive and we’re healthy,” he said. “You can always rebuild. It’s not a loss of life or anything.”
Hundreds flee as fires randomly take, spare California homes
Hundreds flee as fires randomly take, spare California homes
Pakistan locks down capital ahead of a planned rally by Imran Khan supporters
- Interior Ministry is considering a suspension of mobile phone services in parts of Pakistan in the coming days
- Pakistan has banned gatherings of five or more people in Islamabad for two months to deter Khan’s supporters
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan is sealing off its capital, Islamabad, ahead of a planned rally by supporters of imprisoned former premier Imran Khan.
It’s the second time in as many months that authorities have imposed such measures to thwart tens of thousands of people from gathering in the city to demand Khan’s release.
The latest lockdown coincides with the visit of Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, who arrives in Islamabad on Monday.
Local media reported that the Interior Ministry is considering a suspension of mobile phone services in parts of Pakistan in the coming days. On Friday, the National Highways and Motorway Police announced that key routes would close for maintenance.
It advised people to avoid unnecessary travel and said the decision was taken following intelligence reports that “angry protesters” are planning to create a law and order situation and damage public and private property on Sunday, the day of the planned rally.
“There are reports that protesters are coming with sticks and slingshots,” the statement added.
Multicolored shipping containers, a familiar sight to people living and working in Islamabad, reappeared on key roads Saturday to throttle traffic.
Pakistan has already banned gatherings of five or more people in Islamabad for two months to deter Khan’s supporters and activists from his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party, or PTI.
Khan has been in prison for more than a year in connection and has over 150 criminal cases against him. But he remains popular and the PTI says the cases are politically motivated.
A three-day shutdown was imposed in Islamabad for a security summit last month.
Indian man awakes on funeral pyre
- Doctors sent Rohitash Kumar, 25, to mortuary instead of conducting postmortem after he fell ill
- Kumar was rushed to hospital on Friday for treatment but was confirmed dead later
JAIPUR: An Indian man awoke on a funeral pyre moments before it was to be set on fire after a doctor skipped a postmortem, medical officials said Saturday.
Rohitash Kumar, 25, who had speaking and hearing difficulties, had fallen sick and was taken to a hospital in Jhunjhunu in the western state of Rajasthan on Thursday.
Indian media reported he had had an epileptic seizure, and a doctor declared him dead on arrival at the hospital.
But instead of the required postmortem to ascertain the cause of death, doctors sent him to the mortuary, and then to be burned according to Hindu rites.
D. Singh, chief medical officer of the hospital, told AFP that a doctor had “prepared the postmortem report without actually doing the postmortem, and the body was then sent for cremation.”
Singh said that “shortly before the pyre was to be lit, Rohitash’s body started movements,” adding that “he was alive and was breathing.”
Kumar was rushed to hospital for a second time, but was confirmed dead on Friday during treatment.
Authorities have suspended the services of three doctors and the police have launched an investigation.
NATO chief discusses ‘global security’ with Trump
- NATO allies say keeping Kyiv in the fight against Moscow is key to both European and American security
Brussels: NATO chief Mark Rutte held talks with US President-elect Donald Trump in Florida on the “global security issues facing the alliance,” a spokeswoman said Saturday.
The meeting took place on Friday in Palm Beach, NATO’s Farah Dakhlallah said in a statement.
In his first term Trump aggressively pushed Europe to step up defense spending and questioned the fairness of the NATO transatlantic alliance.
The former Dutch prime minister had said he wanted to meet Trump two days after Trump was elected on November 5, and discuss the threat of increasingly warming ties between North Korea and Russia.
Trump’s thumping victory to return to the US presidency has set nerves jangling in Europe that he could pull the plug on vital Washington military aid for Ukraine.
NATO allies say keeping Kyiv in the fight against Moscow is key to both European and American security.
“What we see more and more is that North Korea, Iran, China and of course Russia are working together, working together against Ukraine,” Rutte said recently at a European leaders’ meeting in Budapest.
“At the same time, Russia has to pay for this, and one of the things they are doing is delivering technology to North Korea,” which he warned was threatening to the “mainland of the US (and) continental Europe.”
“I look forward to sitting down with Donald Trump to discuss how we can face these threats collectively,” Rutte said.
Indian man awakes on funeral pyre
JAIPUR, India: An Indian man awoke on a funeral pyre moments before it was to be set on fire after a doctor skipped a postmortem, medical officials said Saturday.
Rohitash Kumar, 25, who had speaking and hearing difficulties, had fallen sick and was taken to a hospital in Jhunjhunu in the western state of Rajasthan on Thursday.
Indian media reported he had had an epileptic seizure, and a doctor declared him dead on arrival at the hospital.
But instead of the required postmortem to ascertain the cause of death, doctors sent him to the mortuary, and then to be burned according to Hindu rites.
D. Singh, chief medical officer of the hospital, told AFP that a doctor had “prepared the postmortem report without actually doing the postmortem, and the body was then sent for cremation.”
Singh said that “shortly before the pyre was to be lit, Rohitash’s body started movements,” adding that “he was alive and was breathing.”
Kumar was rushed to hospital for a second time, but was confirmed dead on Friday during treatment.
Authorities have suspended the services of three doctors and the police have launched an investigation.
Fighting between armed sectarian groups in restive northwestern Pakistan kills at least 33 people
- Senior police officer said Saturday armed men torched shops, houses and government property overnight
- Although the two groups generally live together peacefully, tensions remain, especially in Kurram
PESHAWAR: Fighting between armed Sunni and Shiite groups in northwestern Pakistan killed at least 33 people and injured 25 others, a senior police officer from the region said Saturday.
The overnight violence was the latest to rock Kurram, a district in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, and comes days after a deadly gun ambush killed 42 people.
Shiite Muslims make up about 15 percent of the 240 million people in Sunni-majority Pakistan, which has a history of sectarian animosity between the communities.
Although the two groups generally live together peacefully, tensions remain, especially in Kurram.
The senior police officer said armed men in Bagan and Bacha Kot torched shops, houses and government property.
Intense gunfire was ongoing between the Alizai and Bagan tribes in the Lower Kurram area.
“Educational institutions in Kurram are closed due to the severe tension. Both sides are targeting each other with heavy and automatic weapons,” said the officer, who spoke anonymously because he was not authorized to speak to the media.
Videos shared with The Associated Press showed a market engulfed by fire and orange flames piercing the night sky. Gunfire can also be heard.
The location of Thursday’s attack was also targeted by armed men, who marched on the area.
Survivors of the gun ambush said assailants emerged from a vehicle and sprayed buses and cars with bullets. Nobody has claimed responsibility for the attack and police have not identified a motive.
Dozens of people from the district’s Sunni and Shiite communities have been killed since July, when a land dispute erupted in Kurram that later turned into general sectarian violence.
