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Can we recover from this tragic disaster? This page was last modified on Saturday, November 15, 2008  It’s been a week and the realization that our home, business and all that we owned is gone has hit us full force. Every time we look at something we are reminded that we have ...had that and don't...do need it. The first few days we scrambled to find the necessities in life. Prescriptions, a change of clothes, toiletries, and some shoes for Karen were among the first items drastically needed. After picking up a rental car, the local Wal-Mart was our next stop. It’s amazing how much time and money we spend just for the common things we use each day. If you want to check this out for yourself, just go to your medicine cabinet and start adding it up, you’ll be amazed. The next thing we needed was the ability to make and edit lists, faxes, emails and be able to organize huge amounts of information to get through this enormous administrative task ahead of us. This meant we needed a computer and a way to connect to the worldwide web. Costco helped with a new computer and the hotel provided the internet connection. We immediately did some research on home fires. We determined after much reading that we needed to get an expert to help us through this.
We have a fire investigator, RV appraiser and private insurance adjuster to first and foremost, find the cause of this disaster. If we are to return to a motorhome as a home we need to know what the cause was to feel safe. Secondly, we knew from our research we needed his expertise to help us determine the fair market value of our motorhome. We also have relied on his advice on how the process of determining our loss goes as well as how best to start the recovery effort. With that out of the way, we turned our sights to our insurance coverage and getting a claim filed. More to come on this when we know how it all works out. So far we are pleased with our insurance claim progress. 
We have accessed the damage and are making inventory lists of all that was lost and all that is left of any value. The second list is very short. We thought we were prepared in case of emergency because we had made lists of all we had in the coach and van before the fire but the lists were lost with our computers when the coach burned. We know now, always have backups off the coach for safe keeping. Now we are faced with constructing the list from memory, what a job!
Calls and emails continue to come in and we are making sure we respond to each and every one of them. It has helped us to receive these calls. The insight and information we have received is astounding. We have also received a few contributions. Many of our RVing extended family have offered homes, cars, and motorhomes for us to use while we recover. We are leery of taking these offers because we don’t want to be a bother to anyone but we will be forced to selectively accept some of them if we are to survive this. We have started this by accepting a motorhome offer to spend the next week in someplace other than a hotel room while we wait for the investigation to start. Once we have finished all our business here in eastern Oregon we hope to head west to the rallies where we hope to find a new rolling home.
Yesterday was the 2 week mark since the fire. We continue to receive an unbelievable amount of calls and emails from friends, relatives and even strangers. Offers of homes, money, prayers and support have come in steady. This tragedy has shown us how blessed we are with good friends that are there in our time of need, even under the lousy circumstances.
The first week after we acquired the bare necessities we occupied our time with counting and sorting the items from the back of the van. It was a messy job, deciding what to try to save. We washed things off and dried them in the sun and were still discouraged. Most everything smells badly of smoke. We are hoping it may wear off with time. We boxed it up and MotoSat, one of our prized suppliers and good friends took it to be stored until we have a business vehicle to fill up again. There was an unbelievable trash pile of unusable equipment.
On a little brighter side, one of the offers we received was from George and Debbie Arvidson offering us a place close by to stay. Their motor home in the driveway of their home about 10 miles from where the wreckage is stored and a great step up from a cold hotel room. They are such nice people and we will always be grateful for their help and friendship.
This week was also filled with looking for a new van and checking the possible options for a new motor home. Of course the list making of the lost items in our motorhome is still ongoing. If you haven't made an inventory list of your contents we advise you to do so and then store it off the motorhome for safe keeping.
There has been what the experts call an "intrusive cause and effect investigation". here is waht they found - Investigation Results |
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