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THE DAILY ASTORIAN • FRIDAY, DEcEmbER 21, 2018
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Erick Bengel | Features Editor
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Photos by Colin Murphey/The Daily Astorian
Steve Dopp works alongside a hazmat team sifting through the wreckage of a home in Paradise, California, looking for
hazardous materials.
ASTORIA RESIDENT
ASSISTS IN FIRE RECOVERY
Steve Dopp helps clean up hazardous materials at Camp Fire
metal dribbling down driveways.
This is not the first time the EPA and contractors
have worked at the scene of devastating wildfires in
California and other states.
The North Bay fires of 2017 were part of a series
of 250 blazes across Northern California beginning
in early October. In all, those fires burned more than
240,000 acres, killed 44 people, destroyed 8,900
buildings and cost an estimated $14.5 billion. The
Camp Fire alone burned more than 150,000 acres,
destroyed 18,000 buildings and killed 88 people, with
at least three people still unaccounted for, according
to the Butte County Sheriff’s Office.
EPA Incident Commander Steve Calanog could
not provide specific estimates, but believes the size
and scope of the damage caused by the Camp Fire
was worse than previous fires.
By COLIN MURPHEY
The Daily Astorian
P
ARADISE, Calif. — As two men in white
hazmat suits walked through the remains of
what was once a home, Astoria resident Steve
Dopp kept a close eye on what they found sift-
ing through the piles of ash and debris.
Dopp’s team of Superfund Technical Assessment
and Response personnel is just one of many working
for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to help
clean up a town incinerated by the most destructive
and lethal wildfire in California history.
The Camp Fire roared through this community of
26,000 in Butte County on Nov. 8. It obliterated most
of the town. It reduced homes to rubble and ash and
hollowed out cars and trucks, leaving behind only
burned-out shells. The fire was so hot, parts of vehi-
cles melted away, leaving behind streams of molten
Trees scorched by the Camp Fire stand near a
neighborhood that was destroyed in the blaze.
Nearly every structure in this mobile home park in Paradise, California, was destroyed in the Camp Fire.
See Dopp, Page c3