Firefighter helps rescue dog while battling Eaton Fire: ‘I need to find that dog’
Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu via Getty Images
(ALTADENA, Calif) — While entire neighborhoods were ablaze in Altadena, California, on Wednesday, a scared dog named Max barked at the out-of-control flames engulfing his home.
A firefighter saw him curled up in his front yard, alone and scared. As the fireman sprayed the flames, the dog got closer and closer.
The fireman put his hand out. And the dog came.
“Visibility was pretty poor initially, so we found a place that we could stake out, especially with the winds and the conditions that we were in,” firefighter Slater Lee told ABC News’ Matt Rivers.
“I heard a dog barking, and I was like, ‘I need to find that dog,'” he said.
“The whole garage was involved in pretty heavy flames, and I looked to my side, and the dog was seated with its tail between its legs, just curled in the corner of the front yard, still barking, just in a really sad position,” Lee added.
Lee put his hand down every so often to coax the 60-pound dog into feeling comfortable with him.
“I had the nozzle in one hand cooling the garage, so [the fire] wouldn’t extend over to the house, and then trying to pet the dog and make some light of the situation,” he said.
Meanwhile, the Eaton Fire has continued to grow. It has now scorched more than 14,000 acres with 37% containment, according to Cal Fire. At least 16 people have died in the Eaton Fire, according to the LA County medical examiner.
“I don’t like to take individual credit for anything, you know, and by no means was it any sort of an individual effort,” Lee said of comforting Max. “There’s my whole crew behind me.”
Lee has only been a firefighter for about six months, still on probationary status with the San Marcos Fire Department. His chief told ABC News that some new recruits come and go but “Slater is one of the good ones. He’s going to be sticking around.”
Lee kept the dog calm until another couple of concerned citizens were able to take him. They got him to safety, out of the fire zone, while Lee stayed behind, continuing his work.
Max made it back to his family, alive and well, if a bit traumatized.
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(NEW YORK) — During the final Mass at the All Saints Parish in Buffalo, New York, on a warm Sunday in July, the priests encouraged the few parishioners who came to take comfort in holy scripture.
“For everything, there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven,” the passage read.
On Earth, many parishes are accepting that it’s time to sell their properties. As the person leading renewal and development for the Diocese of Buffalo, Father Bryan Zielenieski is one of many religious leaders across America who have closed houses of worship in recent years.
“We essentially went to half of what we used to back in the early 2000s,” he told ABC News. “We lost about 100 parishes.”
Zielenieski expects he’ll need to shut down another 70 churches in what the Diocese is calling its “road to renewal.” It’s a very biblical name for the challenge facing churches: People just aren’t going as much as they used to.
On average, more than half of the diocese’s churches today are baptizing fewer than one person a month, and 59% of them are spending more than they take in, Zielenieski noted.
“It’s my job and role to not just pray about the situation, but to then look at the hard data and say, where does the church need to move?” he told ABC News.
In the late 1940s, nearly 80% of Americans said they belonged to a church, synagogue, mosque or temple, according to Gallup. Today, just 45% say the same, the analytics company noted, and only 32% say that they worship God in a house of prayer once a week.
In 2019, before the COVID-19 pandemic, America was losing as many as 1,000 churches a year.
Some former churches are being converted for businesses or residential use. One old Methodist church in Atlanta, which was down to about 60 members when it closed, was sold to a luxury real estate developer seven years ago. Now, it’s become a series of 3,000-square-foot condos.
Some of the oldest churches in the world have even turned into bars and nightclubs.
However, another Atlanta church is taking a different route. Pastor Jasmine Smothers is saving the city’s First United Methodist church from closing with what she says is a “God-sized” plan.
The most profitable thing they own is their land, and she’s using it to build more than 300 apartments in the high-rent city — most of which will become affordable housing.
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Pastor Jasmine Smothers says developing residential property on the church’s land will help them stay open. Via ABC News
“It’s literally going to change the landscape of Atlanta in more ways than one,” she told ABC News.
Smothers said the project will give the church the resources to help people and to continue its ministries.
“In the words of one of my friends, this ain’t your great grandma’s church,” she said.
At Calcium Church outside Syracuse, New York, Pastor Milton LaSalle recently acknowledged to his small-town church that, after 171 years, they’re in financial trouble. On a good Sunday, LaSalle has 35 regular members — most of them are in the sunset of their lives. The church hasn’t been forced to close or sell it’s land, the pastor says.
“The aging of the church here, of course, is seen all over America. That makes it harder in a lot of ways. For instance, we lost five of our members last year to death,” he told ABC News.
LaSalle said he’s confident Calcium Church will be able to stay open, but noted that they’ve had to make cutbacks.
They still hold clothing and school supply giveaways, parishioners told ABC News. Parishioner Jeannetta LaSalle expressed the importance of the church in her life, saying that her fellow churchgoers are like family.
“It gives me purpose to get up in the morning,” she told ABC News.
In Buffalo, Father Zielenieski also noted how people turn to the church for comfort in times of crisis, like in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.
“There’s a sociological principle or idea out there that when times are good, people forget God,” he said. “When times are challenging, they go to God first.”
However, Zielenieski highlights the danger of taking the church for granted.
“We’ve never asked the question, how is it going to be there and how is that going to stay?” he said.
The sale of the All Saints Church in Buffalo will close in the coming weeks. The priests told ABC News they have language in the deal that prevents the new owners from turning it into a place that encourages people to sin.
(COLUMBUS, Ohio) — Republican Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine has signed a transgender bathroom ban for students into law.
The law requires students in the state’s K-12 schools, as well as colleges and universities, to use the restroom or facility that aligns with their sex assigned at birth.
The law notes it is not intended to prevent schools from building single-occupancy facilities and does not ban someone of the opposite gender from entering to help another person.
Ohio joins at least 14 other states in banning transgender people from using bathrooms that align with their gender identity, according to the Human Rights Campaign.
Supporters say the ban eases concerns about student’s privacy and protection. Critics of the bill say it creates unfounded fears about transgender students and may instead put trans students in danger of discrimination or violence.
DeWine’s office previously declined ABC News’ request for comment ahead of the bill’s signing. He told reporters this past summer that he has to look at “specific language” in the legislation.
“I’m for people, kids, to be able to go to the bathroom with the gender assignment so that they have that protection, but I’ll have to look at the specific language,” DeWine told reporters.
Transgender health care, bathroom access, sports participation and more have been a key focus for Republican legislators nationwide in recent years — a wave that has prompted hundreds of anti-LGBTQ bills in the 2024 legislative session alone, as tracked by the American Civil Liberties Union.
DeWine has gone against state Republican legislators on transgender issues in the past. He vetoed a transgender youth care ban bill in December 2023, which would have restricted gender-affirming puberty blockers, hormone therapy or surgeries.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
(NEW YORK) — Officials in upstate New York counties have declared a state of emergency as they prepare for a major snowstorm that has already dumped over two feet of snow in the Midwest and is forecast to accumulate more this weekend.
Gov. Kathy Hochul announced Saturday morning that 11 counties, including Erie County which includes Buffalo, are in a state of emergency and many neighborhoods have already seen a large amount of snowfall.
Lake effect snow will continue through Monday with the heaviest snowfall occurring through early Sunday morning, and an additional period of heavy snow late Sunday night into Monday morning, according to the governor’s office. The highest snow totals this weekend are expected around Watertown, New York, where 3 to 5 feet of snow is in the forecast.
“My administration is working around the clock with our state agencies and over 100 National Guard members on the ground to support local communities,” Hochul said.
Travel advisories were issued for Jefferson and Lewis counties, and portions of Erie County.
The state’s Department of Transportation banned empty and tandem commercial vehicles on I-86 from the Pennsylvania state line to I-390 and on State Route 219 from the Pennsylvania state line to I-90.
In addition to the National Guard members, Hochul said extra personnel has been deployed to help with possible power and road emergencies.
Lake effect snow is common this time of year as colder air moves over the relatively warm water of the lakes, leading to extremely localized bands of heavy snowfall for an extended period of time.
Counties in Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania have recorded huge snowfall totals since Friday.
Gaylord, Michigan, picked up 24.8 inches of snow Friday marking their single snowiest calendar day on record and shattering their previous record of 17 inches on March 9, 1942.