Horse trailer loaded with supplies headed for fire-ravaged area

Patti Sexton filled her 16-foot horse trailer with donations collected in Cambridge and Weiser and hit the road Monday with her dog Jack for fire-ravaged Butte County in California.

 After loading up supplies donated by Cambridge residents, Sexton stopped at the Weiser Veterinary Clinic to pick up a small mountain of needed items donated by Weiser residents. 

 People dropped off  30-pound bags of dog food, cases of bottled water, bags of personal hygiene items, clothes, outerwear and more for victims of the Camp Fire.

 “We collected quite a bit of stuff,” she said, carrying bags of dog food to the trailer.

 Sexton planned to go the route through Burns, Ore., Lakeview and down to northern California to Orland, Calif., which is about 45 minutes from Paradise, Calif., the ground zero of the recent Camp Fire.  

 The trip from Cambridge, where she lives, to Orland will put about 600 miles on her pickup truck’s odometer. 

 Sexton used to live in Artois, Calif, andis familiar with the northern California area. She has friends in Orland, Calif., that she can stay with for a couple of days. 

 She’ll use that as a base to get all the donated items to fire victims, many of whom are homeless and scattered around the area. 

 “They will help me get everything where it needs to go,” she said.

 Recent rains have finally doused the deadliest fire on record in California. The Camp Fire started on Nov. 8 and the fast-moving flames killed at least 85 people and destroyed 14,000 homes in Butte County. 

 A California firefighter she knows said the inferno that swept through Paradise in Butte County was unlike anything he had seen in 30 years of fighting wildfires. Propane tanks exploded and the 70 miles per hour wind was literally on fire.

 There are many pets that were separated from their families in the fire that are still in temporary housing in Gridley, at the fairgrounds in Orland and in Chico. Thousands of residents were displaced by the fire.

 Sexton was originally planning to go to California with a pony and a few things, but the trip quickly turned into a relief mission. 

 She mentioned the trip to her neighbor in Cambridge, Debra Dibble, who asked if she was taking the horse trailer. Dibble said “let’s fill it up” with donations for fire victims.

 “She is quite the motivator. She really got the word out,” Sexton said.

 For the past week, Dibble has been getting out the word and seeking donations in Cambridge. The Highway 71 storage unit was used to collect donations in Cambridge. People offered sleeping bags, blankets, coolers, coats and much more. Sexton loaded those up and a few other items people around town gave her.

 “There are thousands of people who have lost everything, so we wanted to do something to help,” Dibble said.

 Her sister-in-law Angie Dibble, who works for the Weiser Veterinary Clinic, has been collecting items in Weiser for the past week, including hundreds of pounds of pet food and outerwear for displaced fire victims in California.