By Ray Shay
A tiny child’s shoe lay in the gutter outside a house, as the surrounding neighborhood was engulfed in flames and smoke. As I watched firefighters scramble to control the flames enveloping the house across the street, I couldn’t help but think of all the people who had evacuated their homes ahead of the Pacific Palisades wildfire.
Over 24 years with the San Diego Police Department and 18 years as a realtor, I have always felt a strong connection to my community. The past six years, I realized I wanted to continue helping my community, this time through the lens of a volunteer independent journalist. My work has taken me to riots in Portland, Seattle, and Kenosha, Wisconsin, as well as internationally. In all of those cases, I wanted to use my law enforcement background to help people understand what is really happening around our small world.
Now, that inner drive to share the truth led me into the heart of a wildfire.
I drove my small pick-up truck along Pacific Coast Highway before turning up the hill at Will Rogers State Beach and into the heart of the wildfire. Emergency responders from all over California were doing everything they possibly could to save lives and the homes that were ablaze around us.
Some roads were flooded, while others were partially blocked by downed power lines and large tree branches hanging over the streets. Everywhere I looked, there was danger. With each gust of the wind, glowing embers would fly into the air and then dance down the street in pursuit of more homes to burn.
I parked my truck on a block where almost all the homes were destroyed and began donning my fire safety equipment. As I pulled on my gloves, Nomex hood and battered fire helmet, an elderly man approached me. His name was Dave. He said his garage had been destroyed, but his home was still mostly standing.
Dave followed my gaze as I took it all in. His neighborhood now resembled a Hollywood movie set for “War of the Worlds.” Most of Dave’s neighbors had lost everything. Along the horizon, countless badly burnt brick chimneys reached quietly into the darkening sky as if they were raising their hands to say a family once lived here.
We stood there quietly for almost a minute. I asked Dave if he wanted to share his story in an interview. He tilted his head slightly to the side and exhaled. He barely shook his head as his lower lip began to quiver, and said, “No, I would be too emotional.”
I touched Dave on the shoulder and said, “I’m sorry. You don’t have to talk to anyone if you don’t want to. It’s your choice.” I knew that if he decided to leave and walked towards the perimeter, the growing crowd of international press gathering near the center of town would swarm him.
Dave stood by me as I removed the locks from my mountain bike and electric scooter in the back of my truck. As I pulled them out, we both chuckled about how ridiculous I would look, zooming around the devastation on a scooter.
I told him, “Well, Dave, this is my support crew. I can go anywhere, not interfere with rescue efforts, and help wherever possible.” He watched me speak with a Los Angeles Fire Captain and introduce myself. As I began to ride off, Dave waved me down. He cautiously looked both ways on the abandoned street before whispering, “Hey, Ray, would you do me a favor? Can you please just watch for my house when you can?”
I promised Dave I would do my best and wished him well.
As I began riding my bicycle around the devastation, I knew something wasn’t right. It just took me a while to figure it out. I realized I hadn’t come across any fire hoses. All the fire hydrants stood quietly at attention, but not a single fire hose was attached to any of them.
Talking to the firefighters, I learned that just one double-jacketed 4” fire hose attached to a fire hydrant could deploy more than 1,000 gallons of water a minute. But these fire hydrants were as dry as the Santa Ana winds blowing across my old, second-hand fire gear. Without an adequate water source to fight the fires, they were forced to play “whack a mole.”
They would find a small flare-up and suppress it using their 1½” single-jacket fire hose, which only releases 20 to 60 gallons per minute. Most firetrucks only hold about 500 gallons of water, which means they can spray at the rated nozzle volume for about eight minutes, and then the tank goes dry. After that, they had to drive all the way down to Pacific Coast Highway to fill up with water and return to fight.
From a law enforcement perspective, it’s the equivalent of sending police officers into a fierce gun battle, handing them a single bullet, and saying, “Good luck, officer, use it wisely.” The entire time I was there, I never saw a single deployment of water from any aircraft.
Upon running out of water they were forced to drop the protective water “fire curtain” shielding the duplex on the left. Almost immediately, heat and flames from the home engulfed in fire on the right begin to creep over and ignites the duplex. A few minutes later, a green fire truck rolled up to use its limited water supply to try and save the duplex. I don’t know if they were successful.
While there, I saw that strategy repeated multiple of times to try and save as many homes and lives as possible. I saw no other options available.
As night began to fall and the winds increased, it felt like we were in a wind tunnel. The noises of homes burning and collapsing were mixed with the frequent sounds of explosions. Some of them sounded like gunfire from stored ammunition in homes. I recall thinking, now that that’s in my wheelhouse.
I have never been a firefighter but I felt honored and humbled to stand quietly with them. A bond among first responders runs deep, knowing that your partner would sacrifice their life to save yours or complete strangers. They serve a noble cause much greater than themselves.
The incessant roar of the wildfire continued to build as we all watched for a single ember to inevitably spark a new fire on a row of undamaged homes behind us. When that happened, the firefighters would turn their backs on one part of the apocalyptic firestorm and use their one tank of water, their one bullet, to try and save strangers’ homes they would likely never meet.
“We all knew that when the wind blew that hard, a thousand working fire hoses attached to hydrants could not stop the inferno.”
It was a constant triage to try and save as many homes, schools, businesses and churches as possible. You could tell almost immediately which ones you had a chance to save and which you could not. All around me, I saw homes with beautiful oak trees, swing sets, trampolines, soccer balls in the yard and last-minute boxes left in front yards turned to ash. There was nothing for us to say to each other as we all knew that when the wind blew that hard, a thousand working fire hoses attached to hydrants could not stop the inferno. It was in the hands of a greater force.
While preparing to leave the perimeter to send my videos and pictures to the 10News Station in San Diego, I saw Dave walking up a steep hill. I figured his wife or kids finally convinced him to evacuate.
I stopped my bike and pulled down my goggles and Nomex hood to ask him if he was okay. Dave was startled. In shock, he initially did not recognize me and just stared at me. He nodded, but both of us knew Dave was not okay. I told him to walk slower and that his home was still there. Dave looked through me with no expression on his face and then put his head down and continued trudging up the hill to safety.
My heart and that of countless others go out to all the victims of wildfires past, present, and, sadly, future. Our hope is that our government can learn from this and do better.
I will close by telling you another little secret about emergency responders and warriors who bravely serve in our armed forces. In the heat of a battle, you can never, ever, turn on the little switch in your heart that activates the emotions you feel seeing so much tragedy and loss.
That switch cannot be touched until the emergency passes, your uniform and sweat-soaked body armor are hung up in your locker, and you can finally catch your breath.
As I drove out of Los Angeles County, I looked out the windows of my ash-filled truck and was finally able to turn that switch back on. I knew somewhere in the vast sea of Los Angeles that over 10 million call home, a little boy or girl was staring up at their mom with their bare right foot pressed against the blacktop of a parking lot. That kid’s mom likely asked, “Honey, where’s your other shoe?” The child probably turned their palms towards the acrid smoke-filled sky, and said, “I don’t know, Mom.”
Well, I do. I can tell you exactly where that shoe is; when I saw it last, it still had your child’s sock that you lovingly stuffed inside. It is in the east gutter, about mid-block of 1600 West Temecula Street, Pacific Palisades.
I’m sorry I didn’t take the time to throw it into your baby stroller by your front door. The good news is that when I returned to my scooter and headed back to my pick-up truck, your home was still standing.
©2025 RayShay. All Rights Reserved. This work may be reproduced, published and/or translated for free, but only in its entirety and provided proper attribution is given to the author and source (@rayshay1097).
Editors note: The name of the homeowner in this story was changed to provide him privacy.
About the author
Ray Shay is a retired San Diego Police Lieutenant and former SWAT Commanding Officer with 24 years of service with the San Diego Police Department (SDPD). With leadership experience across three ranks, he served as an SDPD Regional Academy Training Officer and lead instructor for Use of Lethal Force, TASER and Mobile Field Force. He also contributed to civil disturbance planning and led coordinated task forces related to planned civil disturbances. Ray has managed numerous civil disturbances and protests, both planned and spontaneous. His expertise was instrumental in developing SDPD’s response to major events like the 1996 Republican National Convention, the 2001 Biotech Convention and the 2003 Super Bowl.
Following his retirement from law enforcement, Ray became a realtor and real estate broker, with 18 years of experience in the industry. For the past six years, Ray has also been visiting riots and natural disasters as part of a self-guided effort to report firsthand on breaking news. A credentialed journalist for the past three years, he is driven by a passion for seeking the truth and covering major events in real-time.
Ray Shay can be followed on RayShay.TV, RayShay1097.com, X@rayshay1097 and Facebook/RayShayonScene1097.
NEXT: Police1 speaks with Grey Bull Rescue Founder Bryan Stern about the organization’s recent delivery of Starlink devices to assist the LA County Fire Department with communications during the California wildfires, which led to a suprise collaboration with Elon Musk.