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Why we stayed

August 19, 2012 by J.B.

Since the fire on Monday, many people have asked why we didn’t evacuate the chimpanzees. It’s a good question, and instead of answering everyone individually I thought I’d share an answer that I gave in the comments section of a previous blog post.

To preface, I should say that we certainly took this fire seriously. As the fire approached the sanctuary, firefighters parked their engines around our property and prepared to protect our buildings and those of our neighbors. At that time we were encouraged to evacuate. Diana and I packed up our dog and two cats and Diana drove them to safety. But evacuating chimpanzees is much different than evacuating dogs and cats, or even livestock. Hopefully this post will shed a little light on our decision to ride out the fire as best we could:

Let me start by saying that we are fortunate, as a relatively small sanctuary, to even be able to consider evacuating the chimps. For some of the larger sanctuaries, rapid evacuation would be out of the question for all but a handful of the residents.

Still, evacuating chimpanzees safely is something that takes time, no matter what your situation is. The chimps must first be moved to an area of the building that would allow you to connect a transfer cage or, alternatively, an area that would provide a safe environment for anesthesia. At CSNW, this area is a series of four smaller interconnected rooms that we call the Front Rooms. After the chimps are shifted, transfer cages must be moved from our storage area behind the barn to the chimp facility. The chimps that are cooperative may be loaded into transfer cages one at a time without anesthesia. Those who are not cooperative (most if not all of them) must be manually injected or darted with an anesthetic. Chemical anesthetics take up to ten minutes to take effect and the chimps must be isolated and darted individually so that one chimpanzee is not waking up while you are going in to remove another. After all the chimps are loaded into transfer cages, the cages must be loaded into a trailer and secured (if the chimps are anesthetized the cages can be loaded and secured beforehand). Typically, the transport truck would not leave until all the chimpanzees on board have recovered from anesthesia, so that a medical emergency (like respiratory depression) does not occur on the road, but in the face of a dire emergency this protocol could be ignored.

While doing all of this you would need to weigh the risk of transporting them against the risks of staying. If the fire overtook the sanctuary while the trailer was still in the driveway, the chimps would be at even greater risk. Considering that we had less than an hour’s notice before the fire overtook the property, there is no way that I would have attempted to move them.

Some emergencies cannot be avoided. In these cases, proper planning, construction, and maintenance are the only things that will help. Sanctuaries in the southeast must be prepared for hurricanes, those in the plains states must be prepared for tornadoes, and those on the west coast must be built to withstand earthquakes. For CSNW, wildfires were part of the planning process when Keith and the original Board of Directors were designing the facility. In addition, the county requires a plan for “defensible space”, which is the area around the building that slows or impedes the fire and provides a safe space for firefighters to work in.

The chimp facility is built mostly of concrete, with cementitious siding and a metal roof above the chimps. The exterior is designed to withstand brush fires and stray sparks. Inside the chimp areas there is very little in the way of combustible material. Still, nothing is 100% fire proof, so our fire plan includes a scenario where the interior of the building would be overtaken by smoke or flames. In this case, we couldn’t let the chimps run free because it would endanger the lives of the men and women working to protect the sanctuary. However, we would let them back out into the greenhouse, which would allow them some movement away from an interior fire and some chance to avoid the smoke that would accumulate inside the closed building.

This was the day that we hoped would never happen, but given where we are located, we knew it could. The chimp facility survived due to the firefighters’ efforts, smart planning, good building codes, and a little bit of good fortune. Relocating the chimps to a safe location would have been great, but it would not have been possible in such a short amount of time.

In the coming weeks we will be analyzing our response and determining what went well and what we could have done better. We will undoubtedly be exploring new protocols and equipment based on what we experienced in our real life trial by fire that could help us be even better prepared for future emergencies.

 

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Comments

  1. Lu Vel says

    August 19, 2012 at 4:46 pm

    Please consider that concrete explodes. Best of Luck. I completely understand all the issues involved and am glad everything is ok. Here’s to hoping, there’s no future need for such an evacuation.

    • J.B. says

      August 19, 2012 at 6:32 pm

      This may be true under unusual conditions (i.e. extremely high temperature fires). But for normal conditions, concrete is one of the most fire-resistant building materials. Brush or grass burning within the defensible space would not cause the structural concrete to explode and it would perform better than other materials in terms of fire and heat resistance.

  2. Peggy Faranda says

    August 19, 2012 at 5:08 pm

    Thank you for this explanation. I had assumed with fire there would be no time to evacuate the chimps and this certainly makes that clearer. Thank you for staying with them throughout it all.

  3. Eric Dodge says

    August 19, 2012 at 5:27 pm

    I think everybody did a great job. Especially the building of the chimphouse out of fire resistannt/proof materials to give the chimps a place of refuge so that they don’t have to be traumatized by being transferred. Chimps are difficult enough to manage in a transfer cage as it is, been there and done that. To do that while they are stressed by the smell of smoke and flame, even more so traumatizing.

  4. Marcia Douthwaite says

    August 19, 2012 at 5:41 pm

    JB: Thank you for your comments, and Diana, yours which follow. Your planning and care, as well as other circumstances, saved the day and how thankful we all are that chimps and humans are safe. You all and the fire personnel are our heroes.

  5. marissa says

    August 19, 2012 at 5:57 pm

    JB, thanks for sharing this with us. I had no idea how much was involved in preparing the Chimps to evacuate – definitely the right call and I thank the heroic efforts of you, the staff and the fire department and so thankful all are o.k. Coming through an experience like this gives us a chance t be thankful as well as an opportunity to think through even better options should the need ever arise as you mentioned.

    Hoping the worst is behind and the focus can shift to rebuilding so we can see those beautiful chimps outside again on the Hill.

    • Linda (Southern California) says

      August 19, 2012 at 10:42 pm

      Ditto Melissa. You read my mind!

  6. Jeani Goodrich says

    August 19, 2012 at 10:53 pm

    JB, Thanks for the great and thorough explanation. It helps to put another piece of the puzzle of that day in place.

    Thanks to all of you for sharing your journals on the day of the fire. They made the day come alive and I was able to feel all the emotions happening. I laughed, I cried, I cheered. And I related to sleeping in and being late for the hike. 🙂 but then if you had been on time you wouldn’t have seen the fire and might have even been caught in it! So I am glad, Diana, you were late, as usual. Keep it up.

    Seriously though, thanks to all the heroes of this fire. I’m glad you can now start to look at the future and what can be built on to make it better. The chimps are very lucky. I hope you can also begin to sleep through the night.

  7. Devika Khazvini says

    August 19, 2012 at 11:40 pm

    God bless you all. Everyone works with their own set of challenges and limitations and as long as there is honesty and caring, you really don’t go wrong. Each journey has its own ending, may yours be the happiest ever, may your chimps stay safe and happy and may you find all the help you need to make any changes to face another such challenge!

  8. Amy M says

    August 20, 2012 at 5:21 am

    Thanks, JB, for this very informative post. You guys are the best!!

  9. Amy M says

    August 20, 2012 at 5:46 am

    JB — How did each of the 7 react to the situation?

  10. Wanda Trotta says

    August 20, 2012 at 1:35 pm

    I’m a little surprised that people asked the question. It would seem it would have been much more trauma to the 7 to try to evacuate them and you had very smartly planned so well for fire. It is always obvious that you and all who originally planned the sanctuary exercised much forethought into your chimp haven. Very admirable!!

  11. Wanda Trotta says

    August 20, 2012 at 1:37 pm

    P).S. When things have settled down it would be interesting to know how the 7 reacted to all the chaos going on around them. I would think that their trust in you may have grown as a result of this happening.

  12. Sara Lissabet, Fairfax says

    August 22, 2012 at 10:03 am

    I agree, given the trauma the chimps have endured, the healing they’ve achieved in the time they’ve been at the sanctuary, and the careful planning that went into the construction of the sanctuary, I believe you absolutely made the right choice to stay.

    When you get the chance, please do let us know what and how the chimps reacted to these two weeks of danger and changes to their routine.

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