AYESHA RASCOE, HOST:
High winds and low humidity fueled dozens of fires as they tore through Oklahoma's plains on Friday. As Lionel Ramos of member station KOSU in Oklahoma City reports, emergency officials say the fast flames have scorched around 170,000 acres and destroyed nearly 300 structures.
LIONEL RAMOS, BYLINE: About 50 of those structures were homes in the central Oklahoma town of Stillwater. And Cheryl Rabet's home, along with two of the RVs she rented out for income on the same lot with 23 others, were among the structures in the path of the flames. Rabet said she and her husband were at home, and everything happened so fast.
CHERYL RABET: We were in our - in the house at the RV park, and we just - I mean, it was there in a heartbeat, and we didn't have a chance to grab anything. We grabbed one of our cats, and that was about it.
RAMOS: Myia, their daughter, was at school.
MYIA RABET: They came, and they picked me up, and they said, Myia, we have to go (crying). They escaped, barely. I mean, (crying) I could have come home, and both of my parents could have been gone.
RAMOS: By the time I met Cheryl and her daughter, Myia, they were at a quiet but steady triage center, propped up by Stillwater Public Schools' officials, collecting the basic essentials - a toothbrush, a towel and some clothes were gathered on the table where they sat. Natalie Brown is the school district's family resources specialist. She says the town was prepared for the wind.
NATALIE BROWN: But not the fires - and so yesterday, as the wind started picking up, the smoke started happening clear on the other side of town, and you - it smelled all the way over here.
RAMOS: And just on that other side of town was the Rabet's RV park. I drove there. The family's home of 22 years sits caved in and still smoky, along with two RVs and a pickup truck nearby. One of the mobile homes was being rented by Texans Jesus Jaime Garcia and his friend, who have been in Stillwater for only about five months, working as electricians on windmills in the region. Once the wind started picking up on Friday afternoon, eventually reaching Category 1 hurricane speeds, Garcia says he was let off work early.
JESUS JAIME GARCIA: (Speaking Spanish).
RAMOS: He stopped by Walmart on his way home, but by the time he got there to unload his groceries, Garcia's home was already kissed by fire, as the homes of hundreds of Oklahomans would be that night. Garcia is living with his coworkers for now and the Rabets with nearby family. Others, at one of the triage centers still open.
For NPR News in Stillwater, I'm Lionel Ramos.
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