Netflix’s Fire In Paradise Explores The First Hand Evacuation Experience The During Camp Fire — Out Tomorrow

tahyira savanna
2 min readOct 31, 2019

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On the morning of November 8, 2018, a seemingly small fire broke out in Butte County, California near the town of Paradise. Over the course of a few short hours, the Camp Fire grew into the country’s deadliest wildfire in over a century, killing 85 people and destroying Paradise. Through first-hand footage of the disaster and personal interviews with survivors and emergency response teams, FIRE IN PARADISE retells the terrifying survival stories from that day.

California has been burning for the past few days. This story helps us to understand the horrific and heroic circumstances that fall upon those trying to escape and the firefighters who run towards danger. The visuals are first hand clips of those that were stranded in their homes, those that got trapped trying to evacuate, and a school bus full of grade-schoolers that were ambushed by escalating flames. An entire community has been burned to the ground. Their lives will never be the same and the road to recovery requires building new families and new homes. The film takes the viewer back to that dreadful day in November. We get to experience the real human nature response to panic. What if I can’t save my kid? How are we supposed to go home? My house is on fire! — These are the statements and realities of the residents of Paradise.

We attended the Q&A portion with director, Zackary Canepari, who was very clearly still emotionally tied to the participants he interviewed. Listen below:

Fire In Paradise arrives on Netflix November 1st.

https://www.netflix.com/title/81050375

Watch the trailer below:

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