Daughter explains why father made fatal decision to stay in home during LA wildfires
Topics: US News, Wildfires, Los Angeles, California, Parenting
Poppy Bilderbeck
Featured Image Credit: Sky News
Topics: US News, Wildfires, Los Angeles, California, Parenting
A daughter has spoken out about her 82-year-old father's decision not to evacuate amid the Los Angeles fires.
Five fires are blazing through California, with Los Angeles engulfed by flames. At the time of writing, nearly 30,000 acres of land has been ravaged, over 9,000 structures have been damaged or destroyed and the fires have claimed the lives of at least 10 people, the number expected to continue to rise.
Rodney Nickerson, 82, is one of the victims of the Eaton Fire, his daughter Kimiko having since opened up about her dad's decision not to leave his home in Altadena.
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In an interview with KCAL News, Kimiko explained her dad had been living at his home in Altadena in the San Gabriel Valley and The Verdugos regions of Los Angeles County, California since 1968.
She continued: "This is the house that I came home to as a child and I've been here my whole life, I don't know anywhere else other than here.
"Myself and my brother and my son, Chase and his other grandchildren, this is where we've been our whole life."
The daughter noted she and the rest of the family and neighbors tried their best to get Rodney to evacuate but he refused.
Despite his grandson packing up the car and encouraging him to leave, Kimiko says Rodney told him he 'didn't need to go right now'.
Kimiko said: "He said he'll be fine. 'I'll be here when you guys come back'. And he said his house will be here."
The 'last thing he verbally said' to Kimiko was: "I'll be here tomorrow."
The daughter reflected: "His house was here and he was here too, he was in his bed when I found him. We found his bones, his whole body was there intact."
She added to Sky News: "Like all of us on this block, in four blocks, he didn't think it was going to be this devastating.
"It jumped whole streets, and it hit this community, but it didn't touch the mountainside at all."
Kimiko said she has 'no words to explain [her] feelings at this point in time'.
"I'm just silent and numb and just mentally trying to go through the process," she added.
She resolved: "Every laugh, every joke he told. He was a smart man. He read the LA Times from cover to cover and walked around the Rose Bowl every day.
"He was healthy, he was ambitious… But he went to sleep and died in his bed back there."
If you have experienced a bereavement and would like to speak with someone in confidence, contact GrieveWell on (734) 975-0238, or email [email protected].