Shortly before midnight on May 3, we directly and personally entered the growing multitudes of climate evacuees. Such an event was not unexpected. Our forests had become drier than kiln-finished lumber. If you struck 100 matches and dropped them to the ground, 90 to 94 of them would ignite a fire. Precipitation had become a long-lost friend. The link of a warming climate to such a cataclysmic event was evident throughout the region long before the fire drew its first breath.