>> narrator: tonight- >> by noon we had concededat th the towhad basically burned down. >> narrator:tone year since california's deadliest fire... >> the plan s completely overwhelmed by circumstances. but i think those circumstances re n unprecedented. >> narraarr: frontline tak you inside that day. >> the road's completely engulfed in ames. and i told my husband, i'm like, "i can't run through fire." and he said, "you're greng to have to." >> narrar: exposing the new dangers of a changing climate. >> we just did not anticipate ai re that went seven and a half miles in an hon and half. i don't think anybody envisioned that happening. >> do you think you should have envisied that happening?

>> i'm not going to answer that queson. >> narrator: and a giant power company under scrutiny. >> is what pg&e did or didot , grossly negligent? >> they've been bation, they've violated the probation. if pg&e was individual and not a corporation, i think by now th would be in p >> narrator: tonight on frontline- "fire in paradise". >> frontline is made possible by contributis to your pbs station from viewers le you. thank you. and by the corporation for public badcastadg. major support is pisvided by the john d. and catherine t. macarthur foundation, committede to building a ust, verdant and peaceful world. more information at macfound.org the ford foundation: working with visionaries on then ines of socialhange worldwide. at fordfoudfation.org.or additional support is providedpo by the abrams foundation,it cod to excellence in journalism. the park foundation, dedicated to hghtening public awareness of critical issues.

the john and helen glessner family trust. supportipp trustwohy journalism that informs and inspires. and by the frontline journalism fund, with maj support from jon and jo ann hagler.al and additiupport from laura debos and scott nathan. ♪ >> paradise is...th ere's something about it, there's sothing with the country that's... the trees are beautiful. just living in the mountains, and... t it's healibe here. >> you saw hummingbirds and we'dweleep outside under the stars.

it's a tight-knit community. everyone is super-strong and resilienli here. you never felt more safe than out there in the mountains. ♪ >> good morning and it's... a red-flag fire danger wning is in effect. up to 45-mile-per-hour gusts out of the north today.ri t now, it's 57 degrees. humidity down to 19% already... ♪ w >>e up early the morning of the eighth. the wind was very strong. pine needles were hitting the ro. it's a metal roof, and in my half-asleep state, i thought, "iit raining?" any time you have the winds coming with no rain, it's very nerve-wracking. the season, we were justate itically dry. ow was just like, please,

in a storm. you know, every now and then, i like to wake up early and make the guys breakfast. so when the wind woke me up, i said, "well, this is a perfect time to get a jump on itn my phone was laying on the counrtop nexto where i was cutting up potatoes, and it illuminated. said there was a vegetation fire in the cyon. r: >> narratoeven-and-a-half miles from the town of paradise re had staaded beneath high-voltage electricity tower. the line was almost 100 years old and was owned by pg&e, america's largest electricity company. >> the fire started, as pg&e has admitted, from a piece of equipment that failed, bringing a power line in contact with the steel tower, so you had shards of molten metal that got thrown down into the brush.

>> narrator: in high winds, companies like pg&e can turn off inthe ele tricity in power to reduce wildfire risk. >> we had heard that pg&e was thinking about turning off power in, in several different areas that were in danger of high winds and possibly something happening with power lines.to >> nar but that morning, pg&e had decided not to turn off the power. we would later say this was because the wind decreasing. >> i made one coer around highway 70 to where you can acally see the pulga bridg and so i took my eyes off s e road for two seconds, looked upo saw it and made my report. (rad static hissing) (people talking on radio) >> narrator: the fire s by a narrow dirt track called camp

creek roadro captain mckenzie decided it was too dangerous to drive a fire truck down it. >> narrato he requted air support to put out the fire, but it was too windy to fl ♪ it was a very sinkg, very uncomfortable feeling seeing where it was at, um, and seeing how small it actually was relative to where it was at. it was a manageable-lo fire, if i could get to it. so... >> but you couldn't get to it. >> couldn't get to it. (radio static hissing) (woman talking on radio)

>> narrator: the fire was spreing towards concow, a remote settlement of around 700 people, about halfway between where the fire ignited and paradise. >> i got g couple of phone calls fr other chief officers asking if i wasaying attention to the radio. you know, i think like a lot of people, didn't really take it too serious-- get a lot of fires up there. you know, i told them, you know, t's cold, you know, it's 40s, it's november, it's a nuisance fire. the incidentommand post was set up at the hardware store at yankee hil anso we were preparing to defend concow and contain that fire. (woman talking on radio) >> go ahead.

>> ...21-07... narrator: cal fire-- the state fire service-- began sendinfirefighters to tackle the blaze in concow. >> i drove up highway 70 and ahe wind was basically blowing all us. smoke right over the top of >> nartor: the blaze was soon dubbed "the camp fire," after the road where it started. >> we were stopping down concow, helped out a few the spot fires out around their house. they were relatively small, they were t to 15, maybe 20 feet. and then there was a point in there where the wind just kind of started picking up, and the spig fires that were not a b deal at the time started gulfinguboth sides of the road. ♪

>> my pops had been in concow ever since i can remember, it's always felt so special. it's at the end of concow road. felt like nothing could hurt uss there. and it was home sweet home. >> narrator: 21-year-old jordan huff often visited her granddad, who lived on his own on a small farm. >> he'd grow pumpkins for the grandkids.to so in r, when they were ready to harvest, we'd have jack-o'-lanterns to carve. and they were poa's pumpkins and they were bigger than my pops lost his la. farming incident, but they're the stubborn mountain folk. he was alws outside rking when we showed up, out in his wheelchair working awa a ♪ >> narrator: by 7:the fire

had picked up.p. the wind was spraying buing embers in every direction. a column of smoke was now visible for mis. >> my dad had called my pops. was out there in hisn wheelchair, um, with a hose, um, putting out the fires that were breaking out into his yard, and my dad was, like, you wow, "don't worry about it, you need to go. you need to get out of here and and he said, "okay, i will. i'll grab the dogs and i'll go." ♪ >> narrator: firefighter jeff edson ana colleague were now trapped down by concow lake. >> we came across ur individuals that were running, and they were waving their hands at me, and you could tellr they had eurns and stuff on their skin and their hair. three of them ran and justjump straight in the water, 'cause they were taking so much heat. ♪

command post, chieina wasent aware this was becoming a major fire. >> just be ready to call in personnel that are off-duty right now. >> narrator: but with firefighters in coow trapped, and aircraft unable to fly beuse of the wind, he didn't know how fast it was moving. >> we typically get our fire inteigence, what the fire's doing, how fast it's spreading, from our own line persnel. um... firefighters. what was different about thi day was the fact that as soon as our firefighters engaged, they went right into rescue mode. and they, they were no longer ablenor did they really care, w where the fi spreading. they were too busy on rescuingvi ans, and, you know, ensuring that... of their own safety. so we didn't get g lot of intelligence on how host the spreading.♪ ♪ >> narrator: the fire was moving towards the town of paradise,

four miles ay on the other side of a steep canyon rain the past, fires have rely crossed the canyon, but the camr fire was nowding at a rate of 80 football fields a minute. (telephone ringing) >> the calls staaled coming in slowly as people were waking up in the morning, having their ee, looking out the ndow, and seeing what i couldn't see. (telephone ringing) >> narrator: dispatcher caroca ladrini had been trained to handle calls reporting fires. >> do you see ashes? do you see flames? how close is it? i becae kind of far off cof d be away.s the street or two canyons >> narrator: cal fe normally notifies paradise pof a fire is threatening the town, but they hadn't done so.

>> narrator: as more calls came in, ladrinsays she contacted cal fire, and they told her the fi was north of conc-- arles from paradise. >> did they say anything about the size or the inteity of the fire? >> no. n at that point, they dn't, and, and i didn't ask. generally, a fire that far away would never even get close to paradise. >> paradare police. >> why are so many people calling about this smoke? what... what's going on? still, at that point, i didn't know what they were seeing. (telephone ringing) so all i could do was call cal fire back. what i said was, "can you nfirm with me that this north of concow, that this is not in paradise?op

say there's ashes falling." "yes, it's north of cof ow." that's ohe words that i got. tekay." so i continued t the peoplehat were calling that we were not under threat. (telephone ringi) >> narrator: by 7:45, the fire hacrossed thcanyon and wase threatening paradise and the surrounding area, home to 40,000 people. cal fire issued an evacuation order for residents on the east de of paradise, bunot for those from other parts of town.

>> narrator: 18 minutes after fire entered the town, carol ladrini received a call from cal fire >> when i started as a firefighter inhe mid-1980s, we had large fires. you know, it wasn't uncommon. anwe may be at a large fir for a week or two, maybe even a little bit longer. but then the periods would subside and weould, weould go back, wd regroup, and we'd get ready for the next round. now, in the current fire environment, the season is much longer. drier, less humidity, and, typically, our winters have been on the lower end of avere. >> we measurclimate at weather stations, and whenires burn,

we traceheir footprint. those types of analyses have shown that human-caused climate change has doubled wildfire since 1984 across the western united states abe what would have burned without climate change.ge >> narrator: researchers say that in northern califnia, summers have warmed by an average of 2.5 degrees in the last 5years. at the same time, climate change has made prolonged drought more common in the area. >> what we've observed over the last several fire seasons is that it doesn't rain until late in december or even earlyt january, and tanthat the landscape hasn't seen a drop of precipitation in perhaer eight months. it's that combination of factors, where you get high winds, you get the tigh temperatures, you have fuels combine all of those factors

into a package that is reay explosive from a wildland perspective, where then, if you throw a match into that package, you're going to generate aro catae. (radio static hissing) >> allnits be advised, the town of paradise is under a mandatory evaction. the town of paradise is under a mandatory evacuation. (man bathing heavily) >> i was dispatched to the fire down on the east canyoe edge. so i sli smy body camera on an went behind the house. oa i can caarring, and i could see flames coming up from, from the canyon that were probably 30, 40 feetight. (pickering speaking on radio) n arrator: fire was now established on the east side of paradise. police went door-to-door to ke sure people had left.

>> the fire was swirling around the houses. it wasoming in at all angles. defying any sense of gravity or any sense of, in my mind, what would be normal for a fire. too much was happening, too much was going , and we were not able to do more than just a couple olehandful of streets. to >> narra sergeant pickering made his way to paradise's largest building, featr river hospital. >> my husband texts me, and says, "hey, there's a big fire." and i said"huh." i said, "i didn't see anything. where's it comg from?" he goes, "out of conw." and i said, "okay, well, hopefully it doesn't cross the canyon, 'cause then i'm gonna have to evacuate the hospital." um... and thene saw the orange glow through the patients' rooms. >> for the moment,es.

>> there was peoe that wer w having to carry an i.v. bag with holding theirr own i.v. bag. and then we had people that wer just coming out of surgery that had to be loaded up. >> doctors pulled up with their s.u.vs. and were putti patients in with doctors. >> okay, hang a hard right... >> and nurses are driving thei owgprivate vehicles and tak out their car seats and leavingh em on the side of the hospital grnd. it wasn't a normal evacu th we've been planning and, d rehearsing, it was so fast. >>hat was that? >> anywhere from a finutes to 15, 20 minutes, everything around the hospital was burning and on fire. it went blk real quick

it felt like, it felt like working a night shift. (radio squawking) (pickering sighs) ♪ >> we were stuck in traffic for quite a while in the hospital as everything around us is on fire. >> well, where's the fire department, where's the hoses?se why isn't anybany putting these

fires out? you know, it was so confusing. >> i assumed that the fire was right there, next to me. i didn't know, at the time, that the fire had jumped all thway into paradise. nobody said anything to us. nobody sd, "hey, all of paradise is on fire." (people speaki on radio) >>ultiple structures on fire here... stt towards paradise. >> see the fire's about to jump the road.e (peopltalking on radio)>> picture it like a snoww blizzard. t there was justusands upon thousands of embers blowing through the air.

it was really hard tget your mind around how pidly it was developing. >> narrator: in less than an s hour, the fire swept acre town of paradise, overwhelming the fifighters' efforts to st it. >> t homes, the hoe s are becoming involved. (people lking on radio) >> narrator: the smoke, swirling with burning pine needles andus pieces of ho, turned day t nit. >> an area would catch on fire, homes would catch on fire generating heat, which would throw more embers, that would start another fire. and those winds can push those emrs a long ways. and it just kind of perpetuates into one b fire at once. there was no, there was no flaming front. >> narrator: in a typical fire, the smoke travels straight up, where cooler air puts out most of the embers. but in this fire, wind up of up to 100 miles an hour were blowing the embers sideways. t wind aloft that lofd the embers was a lot stronger

wind than the wind at the surface. and that's what allowed it to..i tates plosion) ...throw fireballs all over our town. i think thin'shatt differentiates thifire from the other fires. that they all had a path, andt. this one did it really didn't.'t it had paths.f it had a lotths, um, and they were all happening at the same time. >> oh, my god! ♪ ke >> there was, , no sirres as warnings or anything. no o telling anyone re what was happening. so we're, like, "oh, let's go check it out." (horn honking) t, just get in the car and we can't even pull cause there was cars all the way down. you codn't even get on the road. >> narrator: jordan huff was trying to leave with her boyfriend alg paradise's main road, skyway. >> everything was red, everything jt seeme

panic. >> i started freaking out, because thfire's coming at us and i didn't wanna see it, i didn't wanna feel ee. like, i didn't wanna be there. i just kinda wanted to sappear, because i couldn't believe this was happening. ♪ ol >>(bleep)! >> it was suffering, moving that slow. i didn't understand whd not everyone was flooring it. like, we we all about to burn alive.iv like, why isn't eryone, like, full speed ahead? like, why are we stuck? like, why? how? >> the town of paradise and the upper ridge has had a community evacuation plan since the late '90s. in the early 2000s, that plan was updated and included maps withones in them. paradise is limited by the number of routes out of town. know.fire is different, you

fires comecorom different directions. so we had to look at varyingan scenard determine what intersections would needulco rolling undeina noally veloping fire. >>arrator: the emergency planners had dided the town into 14 zones. they would be evacuated in turn depending on where the fire came from. >> we actually had a trial run 2008. we evacuated the zones on the coming from concow.or a fire the whole lesson learned from 2008 was, the more you evacuate, the more cars on the rhe more difficult it is to evacuate the town. so we didn't have a plan to evacuate the entire town at once mostly because it wouldn't work. our plan became, i think, probably one of the most elaborate plans in the state. >> narrator: in a review after the 2008 fire, a butte county grand jury warned that the town's roads had "serious capacity limitations" and made numbercommendations, including widening the

evacuation routes. the county's governing b imemented some of the recommendati but thereas no funding to widen all of the roads. ♪ >> one of my personal responses to the grand jury was, if you gave us $10 or $15 million, maybe $20 million, to build newg roads off the um, maybe we could develop a plan that would get people off the ridge, you know, everyone off the ridge at one time. roads cost a lot of mo on a average day, they're builtt e'r traffic th doesn't exist. and then you sayre going to build four lanes that aren't gonna be used except once in a, in a half-century? yeah, that, that's gonna be a pretty hard ask to make. (peopleotalking on radio) >> ...gonna open up both lanes and get everybody out. (people talking on radio) l >> flames, get people moving, now!

>> narrator: there were now over 350 fireghters in paradise. but with burning embers causing new fires all across the town, there was no clear front line for them to fight.eo e talking on radio) >> we conceded..., i can tell y was 9:23 inin the morning, we conceded that intaining the evacuation routes and civilian rescue was our only objective that day, and there was no orders given that contradicted that. >> narrator: although the entire orr, thousands odentscuation were still at home. (sirens blaring) >> my mom had me at 41. for many years, we we like best friends. ent out redbox movies from safeway, whichas right next door, and hang out. and i could tell her anything. 2 >> narratoyear-old christina taft and her mother, paradise. lived in central

>> i wasn't thinking it was that ous at first, and then i the shower, i started to smell oke.ni i was dely panicked. i thought itouldll, like, burn. and i told that to my mom, and she just... she didn't want tost to that negativy. we weren't really, ly,e, arguing, it was just kind of like i was saying stuff and then packing up everything i could into the car.arke it was completely filled in the trunk and the tack seat, and just with thfront seat, you know, for my mom. it went on for a hour, k. she was just not really packing, she didn't get out of her pajamas, and then she artedop calling other to find out what was happening. looking outside, it started getting, you know, traffic and darker. i, you know, i just didn't know what to do. like, it was either i leave or ay and risk my ost life, and i had a life to live. like, i told her that, lik "i have a life to live." and she was just kind of, like,o lkineople on the phone, and they weren't telling her, "leave."

ne>> narrato christina j the thousands of others evacuating the town.re her mosed to come with her. >> it was very slow leaving, but it was all burnt, like, all the way down. people were stopping, getting pesle in their cars, and i stuck, so i couldn't go back,k, even though it wasn't very fug away. it just was horrible, because ie ptkealling my mom, and it just didn't work. >> narrator: christina and her mother had n h received an official evacuation order. the county sheriff's office was using a new alert system called code red. it had an option to send outit a mass alert to every paradise resident, but that morning they didn't use it. >> this was an extraordinarily chaotic situation. there was difficulty in terms o strue, um, the area thate wanted to target.

we had one person who was working to try to get that meage out. i caassure you from the standpoint of the sheriff's office, nobody was waiting around, uh, uh... tootify people. it was wt as though this, hoy delay was calculated orna >> narrator: they nd out alerts using another feature that informed residents zone by zone, but only those who had signed . >> we knew that sign-ups were not where they needed to be.e. but we believed that that was the fure, and our big campgn for 201920as to really increaseb the of people signed up for code red. >> narrator: more than half of resints had not signed up, including christina and her mother.ny and f those who had still didn't get a notification. >> cell phone towers went down-r the ne were so clogged thate couldnco get through it. it was an event that literally outpaced all of our resources almost immediately, literally

outpaced all of the planning had been done prior to this. antoultimately, people have be responsible for their own safety. the best person to craft an evacuation plan for you is you. ♪ >>his is me trying to evacuate. pentz road is on fire, everything is burnt. to >> nar after evacuating the hospital, nurse nichole lly was driving south. she turned off pentz road onto a side street, pearson road. ahead of her, cars were already on fire and had been abandoned. >> i'm getting down intoinhis ravine, and i kind of look, going, "oh, this, this isn't blowblg so fast.his fire is

>> the road's completely engulfed, n flames, and we're stuck in the middle of it. any moment.ould come on me at this is ridiculous, and i'm stuck behind these stupid (bleep).nd >>'m on my, on the phone to my husband, and i'm screaminamfoamhim. m, like, "nick, you got get to me, you have to hurry, because i'm not going to make it." and he said, "i'm trying, i'm going to get to u." and i'm, like, "i'm going to die, and i'm, i'so sorry." and... and my car is starting to fill up with smoket that point. and i told my husband, i'm, like, "the car's filling up with smoke, i have to get out of the car."ke and he's, "get out and run." and i'm, like, "i can't get out and run, you don't understand, there's fire everywhere, and i can't run througfire." and he said, "you're going to have to." ad

>> t>> town of pe, almost more than any other town that i've heard o had really thought about the issue of fire and evacuation, d they had a plan. and the plan was completely overwhelmed by circutances. i think the circumstances were not unp ucedented. we have had a number of fires over the last several years prior to the camp fip that had so of the characteristics, in paadicular, e rate of spre d the total ineffectiveness efforts.ind of suppression >> narrator: climate cmange hasi coted to making fires bigger and more frequent. ten of the 20 most destructrve res in california have happened in the last four years. >> fires are differe today. you need to plan differently. yohave communities that ar saying, "we have our evacuation plan."

but if the pn involves driving down a road like the one in paradise, that was essentially blocked by the fir that's not a very good plan. the road is narrow and ll become gridlocked, not a nery good plan.20 >> so, in abou, we developed this binder. and we carry this binder in our vehicles. and this binder includes evacuation plans andraffic y,ans, um... evacuation plans for every communoothill community in butte county. >> why, given that there have been very fast-moving fireg before, was it not part p the plninghat it might ba possibility to have a fire of this speed and intensity? >> ion't think we've ever seen that before. so i don't think that it was somethg that was, that was ever envisioned. as far as modeling, we did plan for a rapidly developing fir we just dit not plan for, we just did not anticipate a fire that went seven-and-anhalf miles in an hour and a half. i don't think anybody envisioned thatappening. >> do you think you should have

envisioned that happening? >> i, i'm not going to answer that qstion. ♪ >> we've got four trapped in the basement. four people trapped in theme bant.ra >> narr: an hour and a half after fire hit paradise, thousands were trying to leave, but many oths were trapped in their homes. 18 miles from the fire, cal fire's emergency center was receiving 911 calls. >> the phones rang and rang and rang, and they didn't stop. >> it was loud, it was, it wasis it was constant. >> i answered the phone, and i heard a lady-- actuall iy,eard three ladies.

ki>> they were coughing, c.. she had a hard time even were.ng me exactly where they >> they re in a room with, she told me, "no windows, i, i can't get out." and i couldn't... i couldn't leave her. st >> ited getting real staticky. and i had no response. i was talking to myself. and after nine minutes and, ndd something, the phone went dead. i just couldn't help her. and i just had t hhit the next, answer the 911, and start allal

over. (people talking in background) ♪ >> here? >> i gotta go. >> narrator: by midmorning, refighters were trying to make it down the road where nichole jolly was stranded. the temperature at the center of the fire was now around 1,800 degrees. >> i'm running up this hill, and it's a pretty steep hill, and i couldn't see anything. and i'm putting my hand overy

eyes, and the flames are just hitting the side of me. i just was thinking,please let there be a vehicle or something that i can jump into,"e cause i waso he at that point. and i ended up touching the back of a fire engine, and i'm, like, "oh, yaya , re engine." c i sat in tter, and we were stuck, we were stopped. and i'm, like, "why aren't we moving?" and he's, like, "well, there's rs on fire all around us." look, we're in a fire enginehi this is wh ithing is built for, you know. it's, this thing's meant to go throthh fire no, those things are not mea to go through fire. >> i cou start hearing a distress call for air support. and you uld hear the urgency in their voices on the radio. i remember it being pitch-black outside and zero visy and knowg that that was impossible. i swered him back, inappropriately, uh, using his

first name. i said, "john,here are you?" >> nartor: dermined to get to his colleagues, joe kenuedya drove lldozer through the flam. >> we're hearing this noise it was really loud.. it was this clasking chains. you could hear, it was, like, thunk-thunk-thunk-thunk-unk.un >> i started taking fully involved vehicles and moving them away the best i could. >> and he's flipping them over, and it's just a miracle. and he cleared this way for us. >> what happened on pearson road we n't train air. they don't teach us how to move fully involved cars. u they teahow to aid that. there were several times where it crossed my mind that this was a verya ad idea. but if people were counting on me to keep going and, uh, not stop... >> narrator: joe kennedy managed to clear the road so nichole and the firefighters could get to safety. he contied working for another 24 hours..

>> he kept saving people on that road no a/c, no fire blankets, just glass ndows in theiddle of this inferno. ♪ to >> nar the fire had now burned around 20,000 aes and was visiblfrom space. ♪ >> 21-54... (peoe talking on radio) >> our air-tac officer gave a report, where the fire was and how much was being impacted. fire's progressed e way"the through town." and anesreports of civilians trapped and rescues,nd, youyo know, we'd already had reports of a lot of fatalities. >> and by noon, wead conceded that the town had bay

burned down. (people talking on radio) >> nartor: it took onlfour hours for paradise to be destroyed.nd by thef the day, 50,000 5 people had managed tescape, scattering to neighboring towns. >> there was literally a point hell to, there was againt from and there was air to breathe. d it w this type of feeling that changes your whole tire life. "i just got this chance to be able to live again." >> my mom took us backo the house that my kids were staying at. and i see my husband just pacing in the driveway, ayd he's just pacing and pacing and pacing. and i'm, like, "mom, you need to go, you need to get wn there, i see nick."d e's, like, "nichole, we'ree' in a residential area-- i can't, i can't drive fast." and i'm, like,then you need to let me out." and i got out of the car, and i ran fan er than she was drivin and i just grabbed onto my husband. and i'll never forget what he said.

he said, "thought i almost lost you." " and i'm, like,know." ♪ " " >> arrator: a weeafter the fire started, more than 5,000te firefi were tackling the blaze, from thground and the sk ♪ >> thereas nothing standing, and there wee still homes burning. you know, power lines were downn cars were ed, they were still burning. it looked like a war zone, it looked like bombs had been drped on the town. >> it was heartbreaking to me. i grew up in that town, um, i graduated from high school in that town. i was the fire chief in that town and honored tbe the fire chief in that town, and it was heartbreaking to see.

♪ >> narrator: paradise burned for over two wee finally, t first winter rainss came and put the fire out. it had burned 153,000 acres, an area the size of chicago. ♪ california had eadr seen.ve fire around 30,000 people lost their homes. it took many weeks to idtifyti those who died. >> it was actually thanksgiving day whenhey nfirmed it. >> narrator: christina taft had not heard t om her mother since the morning ofhe fire.e. >> she was found on the property in the living room.

she was still inside, she wasn't able to get out. and probably, like, it w right by the window, so thatth s really horrible imagining that she didn't probably knowat o do or something. i don't thk e reallyly realized it was as bad as it was. i blamed myself, i blamed authority, i blamed the other people, i blamed a lot of things, and, um... i'm not really angry at her. people, i think they expect there's an emergency, theyet notified. i think if we did have a order, it would have made difference to my mom. ♪ >> narrator: 85 people perished the camp fire. the majority were over 65 years old. some were trapped in their cars, others were still in their homes. >> it breaks my heart that theya got a e sense of surity.

it breaks my heart that i and anybany else that was answering the phone that day was not ableg e them more information, better information, faster information. it kind of snowballs on you. ♪ >> could you have got evacuation orders out to communities that were likely to be hit before they were hit?hi >> i mean, we can always monday, you know, monday quarterback it. i know what you're saying, but, no, i mean, maybe, maybe five minutes earlier.ie but the ise wasn't how fas we notified ife public, it was how fast we uld get them off the hill.ta the transpon system would only hold so many vehicles, and

were trying to put more vehicles othe road than it could hold. ♪ >> i have no doubt in my mindat f we, as public safety agencies, had not done what wedi did, the cons would have been much worse and there would have been more loss of life. b it w. but this fire affected tens of thousands of people in a matter of a few hours the plan was implemented. i, i'm very confident in saying was, it was successful. was it flawless? absoluly not. ♪ >> we never gave up hope. you know, we kept looking, and he can't read or write, soe thought maybe hee ouldn't get in contact with us. >> narrator: jordan huff was waiting for news about her, grandfather o had been up >> it was two weekr, my mom called me, and she was all like, "jordan..." i knew what the phone call was,

because, like,y mom doesn'tn' call to talk. she told me they found pop's ahdy, and i was like, "yeah?" and then like, "they found thd bodyd n the home." know, i just cried.," and, you i didn't know what to say, and she asked me if i'm okay, and it ung up the phone, because you're not okay. we went out there on december 4, me and my dan only. literally, everything is gone except, you know, you go out to the back fence, and you see a wheelchair. to a crisp all the way, dragged all the way right next to the wheelchair and a bucket of water. your mind, like, we,ts to make a imag but you don't really want to b make an imag iutdoes i anyways. and... and man, is it crazy to have a image like that in your head. he was insanely tough andnd

smart,e was a gentle giant. ♪ >> just going around the community, and you see someone that you haven't seen for a while.er "where we you? what hapned to you?pe whatned to your family?" it's our local 9/11. this is a day that we will waysemember. november 8erill always be a date tha just... seared in the collective consciousness of our communit >> narrator: six months after the fire, the buttcountyst ct attorney launched an investigation into whether to t bring criminal chaes against pg&e, the company whose power line had started the fire. >> is what pg&e did-- or did not do-- grossly negligent? something that is beyond, ll tyond ordinary negligence?

one of the chargt we're looking at under california penal code section 452s reckless arson. "to prove the defende t is f this crime, the people must prove beyond a reasonable doubt that, one, the defendant rned or caed to ed burned property, uh, or fornd"-- we've got that. that the fired burned and inhabiructure or the fire caused great bodily injury to another person. ay, we've got structures-- nearly 1000, 85 people got that element.t the elemat is the-the last elemen it says, "and the defendant did so recklessly." ng>> narrator:g&e has a history of safety violations and a criminal conction for a gas explosion in 2010. its equipment has been linked to many destructive fires in i californrecent years.

was fined nendredsmes and, it faced more than two, almost $3 billion worth of fine you know, if pg&e was an individual and not ahi corporation, i by now they would be in prison. there's just been repeat offenders, they've been on probation, they've violated the probation. the problem is you can take a corporation and put it into prison. >> narrator: in the months after the fire, reporters at "the wall pg&e had been warntsovered that trngsmission towers were agi and that com cnents might fail. >> in 2010, they had an outside contractor come in and l thked at this and said, "thed verage age of your towers is 68 years old, but the mea so, you know, in a pg&e 65." was sort of playing with fire over the years. w the sically saying, "look, we will let these transmission lin l age in place, anif there's a problem wit one of them, we'll go out and fix it." >> without climate change, the consequences of failurof a trsmission line, it's relatively modest.

italls down, perhaps, or.. and it causea fire, and the fire department comes and puts it out. so, the system has been maintained, you know, with some preventi maintenance but also with a philosophy th it can be run until it breaks. the thing is that the costs have changed. the ris have chaed. >> narrator: pg&e declined to be iewed by "teontline," but said in a statement that the company "disagrees with y suggestion that it knew of any specific maintenance conditions that caused the camp fire and nonetheless deferred work that would have addressed those conditions." it added, "since 2010 &e has spent hundreds of millions on line preventative work". >> pg&e is taking this exaordinary step of sayingyioo we can't handle this liability anymore. so that during the days, red flag days, when there's w humidity and high wind, we're just going to shut off the

wer." and it's sort of a stunning thing to think about, but there increasingly, , are days, and-and multiple days in rthern california, where communities suddenly don't have power anymore. >> narrator: pg&e has now filed for bankruptcy protection because liabilities arising from wildfir. it estimates that it could face at least $10.5 billion in damages from the camp fire alon >> i think this is one of the first real climate aptation problemslehat at least america has confronted.ed and thiss not a static problem.we have a problem that's going to grow wo ge inevitably over the next several decades. >> narrator: some scientistsbe eve that fires in california could increase in size dramatically by the middle of the century if temperatures continue to rise. >> everything was perfect that dafor a massive, destructive incident to do what it did. and it's in place everywhere.

everywhere in california, arizona, nevada, washington, oregon. and it's like whe 's... you don't even want to think about itlike, "what's next? can it be worse than that?" and the answer is ye ♪ >> the more data, the better the ai works. in the age of ai where data is the new oil,hina is the new saudi arabia. there will be a chinese an american tech sector. be >> machines are automating some of our skills. >> when i increase productivity through automation, jobs go away. >> it has pervaded so many elements of everyday life. how do we make it transparent and countable? >> go to pbs.org/front ne for more on pg&e. >> is what pg&e did or did not do, grossly negligent? >> and more about the emergency alert syst

paradise. >> people i think they expect if there's an emergency th'll get notified. i rink if we did have an or it would have made a difference to my mom. >> connect to the frontle community on facebook and metwitter, and watch anytin the pbs video app or pbs.org/frontlintl >> frontline is made possible by contributions to your pbsat n from viewers like you. thank you. and by the corporation for public broadcasting. major support is provided by the john d. and therine t. macarthur foundation, committed to building a more just, verdant and peaceful world. more information at macfound.org. the ford foundation: working with visionaries on the frontlines of social change worldwide. at fordfoundatioorg. additional support is iovided by the abrams foundati, committed to excellence in journalism. decated to heightening public awareness of critical sues. the john and helen gle family trust. supporting trustworthy

journalism that informs an inspires. and by the frontline journalism fund, with major support from jon and jo ann hagler. and additional support from laura debonis and scott nathan. captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org >> for more on this and other "frontrone" programst our website at pbs.org/frontline. ♪ to order frontline's, "fire in paradise"vd onvisit shoppbs or call 1-800-play-pbs. this program is also available on amazon prime video. ♪

you're watching s ♪ ♪ or -you've said you'd f middle-class tax cuts. -the front line is just up here. river... -she took me out to those wetlands. -i think we'ree'ff to a great start. ♪

(explosions booming) (guns firing) (helicopter blades whirring) - [narrator] saigon was now encircled and south vietnamese troops could not move up more than 10 miles along any road. beyond that, the communists were iting. saigon was about to fall. (soldier shouting in foreign languag