LAKEPORT >> State wildlife Warden Timothy Little normally rescues injured birds and distressed river otters. On Saturday, Sept. 12, at the start of the Valley Fire, he saved three additional lives: two elderly women and a baby trapped in the fire’s path.
The day started like any other with a round of routine patrols for Little, a warden for the California Department of Fish & Wildlife (CDFW), but the day would soon became anything but ordinary.
Little, along with fellow Warden Ryan Stephenson, were in separate four-wheel-drive patrol trucks leaving the scene of a call on Cobb Mountain when they saw the plume of smoke coming from the fire. They contacted the Lake County Sheriffs Office dispatch center to offer their help and then headed towards the smoke.
Stephenson and Little were helping with evacuations in the Anderson Springs-High Valley areas when they heard the call come over their radio scanner of an elderly woman trapped in her home on Pine Summit Road in Cobb.
After hearing radio reports that other emergency vehicles were unable to respond due to heavy fire on both sides of the road and debris and downed power lines in the road, Little headed that way.
He found the address, entered the two-story house and headed up the stairway and was surprised at what he found.
“The first thing I saw was a baby standing at the top of the stairs looking at me,” Little said. “Then I found the grandmother. I knew the fire was coming that way very fast so I had to get them out now.”
Carrying the baby and leading the grandmother down the stairs, the trio made it outside where all hell was breaking loose, with flames threatening and smoke and ash heavy in the air.
Luckily, a neighbor of the elderly woman was outside near her loaded SUV and she made room for the women and her grandchild.
“I followed them part-way down Cobb Mountain, until they were safe, then went back to continue doing evacuations in the area,” Little said.
It wasn’t long after returning to help evacuate other residents that Little heard another radio call that an elderly woman was requesting paramedics because she could not make it out of her house without help. Then the news got worse: no medical crews could make it to the woman in time to save her.
So again, Little jumps into action, racing to the house on Hot Springs Road in Middletown, five miles away. “I had to drive through some crazy flames down Highway 175 to Middletown,” he said
“When I got there I found an elderly woman who recently had back surgery and could barely walk,” he recalled. “I tried to carry her down the stairs but she was in extreme pain, so a neighbor helped me walk her slowly down the stairs step by step. I went back and get her dog, got them in a neighbors car and on the road.”
Little then returned to Cobb Mountain to help with additional evacuations.
“We got many calls of people trapped in their homes,” he said. “I drove through neighborhoods with my lights and siren on and was on my public address system telling people to get out. I wanted to make sure everyone got out.”
Little and Stephenson started their evacuation work at about 2 p.m. Saturday and remained on the job until 2 a.m. Sunday.
Little said he wasn’t really aware of the overall fire situation until later that Saturday while with Stephenson.
“At one point, I realized we were on top of a mountain engulfed in flames. I told Ryan we had to get down the mountain,” Little said. “We drove down the road (Hwy. 175) with 100-foot flames and heavy smoke all around us. There were power lines down and fiery debris in the road. It was total chaos.”
The fish and wildlife officer had no time to reflect on the overall scope of the disaster unfolding around him and later, at home with his family.
“I never thought about the fire until everything was said and done,” he said. “What happened really set in when I walked through the door of my home and my kids came running up to me.”
In an interview with the Lake County Record-Bee, Little was asked if he heard about someone rescuing two elderly women and a baby from a fire, would he think them a hero?
“I would consider then a very good person who was doing their job,” he responded. Pressed further, he added, “I guess I would consider them a hero.”
But Little does not consider himself a hero.
“I took an oath to protect and serve and that’s what I was doing,” Little said. “Others were doing the exact same thing that Ryan and I were doing. We were just doing our jobs.”
However, CDFW Chief of Patrol David Bess said it goes a bit further than that. “Tim Little’s bravery and courage are a credit to both CDFW and the State of California.”
Reflecting on the fire, Little said, “It’s hard to be positive about the whole situation. People lost their belongings, their lives. I’m sorry for the people who didn’t make it and for the people whose houses were lost.”
Little hasn’t been reunited with the trio he saved but he said he hopes to meet with the Cobb grandmother in the near future.
Little, 33, lives in Lakeport with his wife, Tonya, and 3-year-old son, J.D., and 18-month-old daughter, Alayna. The couple are expecting another son in late January.
