https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/13/us/california-wildfires-victims.html
Questions have been raised about the effectiveness of emergency alert systems in telling people to evacuate. Sonoma, Napa and other counties have alert systems that send text messages to mobile phones, but those warnings generally go only to the people who have signed up to receive them, and the fires knocked out cellular service in many areas.
The more aggressive “Amber alert” system, with text messages and screeching alarms, can reach nearly every mobile phone in a region, but it was not activated on the night the fires broke out. Officials have said that they were concerned about setting off a panic and jamming roads.
The authorities described a chaotic scramble to evacuate residents from Santa Rosa amid thick smoke and flying embers.
“There wasn’t time to map out anything. There wasn’t time to make a plan,” said Sgt. Spencer Crum of the Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office, one of a dozen officers on duty on Sunday night.
Sergeant Crum said he and his fellow officers drove up narrow driveways, blaring horns and sirens. He remembers repeatedly screaming, “Get out of here now!”
Some residents resisted. Some were in wheelchairs; he lifted them into his patrol car. “I said, ‘You are going to die if you stay here,’” Sergeant Crum recounted. “We did the best we could with the time we had.”
The sheer speed at which the fire spread and jumped that first night also made it impossible to keep track of what was burning.
People delayed evacuation or even stayed behind for really bizarre reasons. You have to be able to evacuate in minutes.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/14/us/cailfornia-wildfires-survivors.html
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