Thursday's Hillside Fire Nearly A Repeat Of A 2004 Disaster

“I am in shock, and I’m at the point where I want to move,” said a distraught Sonja Snavely, whose family lost their home to a fire in 2004, and nearly lost it again on Thursday, when a grass fire behind Alhambra High School destroyed two acre of hillside, her barn and part of her fence.

"The barn was my husband's man-cave," she said. "It's where he kept all his power tools and things like that." 

Fire investigators say it’s unclear how the fire started. Snavely said in addition to losing her barn, garden and fence, she has lost confidence that her family is safe. Further, she said a simple solution could solve the problem – goats.

“I have repeatedly asked the school district to use goats to clear those weeds off the hill,” she said. “The district has created a fire break, and that helped this time, but if the wind had been up, which always happens here in the afternoon, the fire would have easily jumped the firebreak and taken out our house. We want that hill cleared,” she said. “We want them to use goats.”

The fire on Thursday burned about 2 acres of grass on the hillside behind the school, and at one point fire officials had students shelter in place on campus until the fire was under control.