Like an apparition, a woman appears out of an inferno, flames swirling, her hair and dress whipped in searing wind, bright embers skidding along the roadway under her feet. For a moment, it seems impossible that she will survive.
But then the brief video, which splashed across social media after being captured Tuesday, records her salvation: a vehicle flashing emergency lights and veering toward her, a last-second chance of escape. The video ends as she reaches the door.
The witnesses who recorded the harrowing moments in the Cleveland National Forest in Riverside County, California, part of the Airport fire, were Josh Boothroyd, 34, and Xavier Perez, 21, of OC Hawk, an independent media collective that often sells its work to television. Operating under a state law that allows media workers to get much closer to disasters than other civilians, the two were filming the fire’s destructiveness to highlight the significance of what firefighters do.
In an interview Thursday, Boothroyd said that the fire had jumped Ortega Highway, setting parts of the road itself on fire as it was surrounded by flames.
“Right as we were pushing back more, because the fire line was coming, I look over and I saw a figure fall, like someone walking,” Boothroyd said. “She tripped and fell. And I thought, ‘Who was that?’ ”
The woman has not been publicly named. Fire officials identified the rescuer as a Riverside County battalion chief, Mike Martinez.
It appeared to show Martinez’s dedication to his firefighters, and a significant amount of luck, that put him in that terrifying place at just the moment to save the woman, who fire authorities said is being treated at a burn center.
It was about 3:30 p.m. Wednesday, near El Cariso Village, a tiny and isolated community in the national forest. The chief’s firefighters were retreating, forced back by the raging fire, and planning to regroup in a safer spot, according to Capt. Steve Concialdi of the Orange County Fire Authority. The area had already been placed under evacuation orders.
“He wanted to make sure all of the engine companies were out of the fire’s path,” Concialdi said. “He was the last one out. And that’s when he saw her walking on Ortega Highway, coming out of the smoke and flame.”
Boothroyd, the videographer, said Martinez’s vehicle appeared to be leaving — but then cut back and drove toward the figure in the flames.
Martinez has been back out in the field in the days since the video was taken, commanding other units. In an interview with KABC in Los Angeles, he described the next few seconds. “I started screaming at her, ‘You need to get in! You need to get in!’”He said he opened the door and grabbed her, pulling her into the back seat.
Martinez pulled the vehicle out of the flames, Concialdi said, and then got a firefighter-paramedic to jump in and start treating her while the chief maneuvered the vehicle down the mountain. He called for an ambulance to meet them at the bottom, which took her to a hospital, Concialdi said.
Boothroyd might have been speaking for many of those who watched the video when he said, “It was a surreal experience.
“You’re never expecting someone to just pop out of nowhere and be walking through that.”