Disabled People Struggle to Evacuate From Wildfires

U.S.|‘We Didn’t Have a Plan’: Disabled People Struggle to Evacuate From Wildfires

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/12/us/wildfires-disabled-people-evacuation.html

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Chuck Lindahl in his living room at his home in Chester, Calif.Credit…Christian Monterrosa for The New York Times

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‘We Didn’t Have a Plan’: Disabled People Struggle to Evacuate From Wildfires

In Northern California, a region troubled by fire, many people with disabilities live in rural areas that lack the resources to support them during disasters.

Chuck Lindahl in his living room at his home in Chester, Calif.Credit…Christian Monterrosa for The New York Times

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By Amanda Morris

• Sept. 12, 2021

A mandatory evacuation notice blared from Joyce Lindahl’s phone one day in July as the Dixie fire bore down on her home in Northern California. But her biggest concern was an hour away.

Chuck Lindahl, her brother-in-law, is paralyzed from the neck down, and his professional caregivers live in places where residents had already been ordered to evacuate. If his family [...]