Res­i­dents of Care­nage en­dured what they de­scribed as a “trau­mat­ic and fright­en­ing” night af­ter a fast-mov­ing hill­side fire crept to with­in me­tres of their homes, forc­ing some fam­i­lies to evac­u­ate while oth­ers scram­bled to pro­tect their prop­er­ties.

In the af­ter­math, Coun­cil­lor for Ch­aguara­mas/Pt Cumana, Kevon Williams, re­newed ur­gent calls for the re­in­state­ment of re­for­esta­tion work­ers, warn­ing that com­mu­ni­ties re­main dan­ger­ous­ly ex­posed as fires con­tin­ue to threat­en hill­side ar­eas.

Williams said the for­mer forestry crews, once re­spon­si­ble for cut­ting and main­tain­ing fire trails and co­or­di­nat­ing com­mu­ni­ty re­sponse, rep­re­sent the “on­ly prac­ti­cal so­lu­tion” to pre­vent­ing small fires from es­ca­lat­ing in­to ma­jor in­ci­dents.