In Ruffy and Longwood, locals return to devastation as tales of courage emerge

After two sleepless nights, Ann and Jamie Laherty-Hunt finally returned to the blackened, scorched ruins of their once dream home on the outskirts of the fire-ravaged hamlet of Ruffy.

The trees in the garden are still smoldering. The house is a pile of crushed and twisted tin and rubble.

Ann races to control seven goslings. They flap their wings and chirp as I take them out of their metal cages.

“My friends, my babies,” she says, tears streaming down her cheeks. “Oh, thank God you’re okay.”

His four alpacas and two cows roam a burned pasture nearby.

“I’m so glad our animals survived,” says Ann. “That was our main concern. We can rebuild our home. We have lives and we have animals.”

The couple, who are both nurses, had planned to stay to defend their home.

They were able to extinguish the raging fire, which started on their back porch and sent thick black smoke into the house.

But then the roof caught fire and began to collapse on them.

They loaded their golden retriever, Barry, and their poodle, Millie, into their car and furnished it with only the clothes on their backs as bright, orange flames engulfed their entire property.

“Jamie just said, ‘we have to go,’” says Ann.

“We were too stressed to be afraid. He worked so hard on this garden. He devoted his whole life, his love and his soul to this garden. It was very difficult to drive while watching it burn. There’s just absolute sadness, it’s all over.”

The couple were among scores of locals who returned to the tiny hamlet of Ruffy on Saturday for the first time after an anxious wait after their home was destroyed by fire.

The charred, smoldering roads leading to Ruffy are littered with dead cattle, kangaroos and downed power lines.

Tired of waiting for authorities to arrive and clear the roads, some residents were using bobcats along with chainsaws and loggers to clear the way home.

Ann says there’s a feeling of being forgotten as fires continue to grow across the state.

“When you come back here you feel a little abandoned and lonely,” he says. “The numbness is starting to wear off and I’m starting to feel a little bit. I actually prefer the numbness because the other emotions are so overwhelming.”

Ruffy’s historic schoolhouse, built in the 1800s, was destroyed along with the hamlet’s community center, telephone switchboard and at least 10 homes.

CFA captain George Noye says the devastation caused by the fire was similar to the explosion of an atomic bomb.

“We couldn’t see hell, and that’s what I imagine being in the depths of hell feels like,” says Jamie.

Across the street from Laherty-Hunts, Mark Noye, his brother and their 86-year-old father Henry did not sleep for nearly two days as they battled a ring of fire swirling around them.

The beloved family managed to save their home on Ruffy’s edge, but they were still fighting fires Saturday morning.

“It was so exciting,” says Mark. “The winds were so fierce. That was the scariest part. But there was fire all over the land, from border line to border line. We were at it non-stop until we finally got it.”

Devastating stories emerged from the town of Ruffy about farmers returning to blackened pastures, dead animals and destroyed homes.

“Ruffy was shocked afterwards,” says Mark. “Some people saved what they could, others lost absolutely everything, and it’s going to affect them the most. Nobody had a chance to process what happened.”

Henry said he was devastated to hear that houses were in flames just across the street from the local fire station.

But he says the locals who stayed behind banded together to protect whatever they could.

“It was incredible what they all did,” he says. “I’ve been around so long, I’ve seen a lot of fires. But this was the worst fire I’ve ever seen.”

Just over 12 miles from Longwood, Shane Peterson uses a hose to douse glowing embers on property owned by his boss.

The inferno around it ravaged the forests and destroyed the small town.

“Some people had to fight three times to save their homes because spot fires just won’t stop,” he says.

Peterson, who lives at the local bar in Longwood, says he and the saloonkeeper open the doors to anyone in town.

They distributed free beer, baked pizza and meals to firefighters until the power went out. There is still no electricity in the city.

“Some people who live in this area come to the bar just to have a quiet place, so they can become desensitized and do things like that,” he says.

Peterson says he was touched by local people’s stories of courage.

“There were two teenagers who stayed behind and fought a fire at another man’s house for hours,” he says.

“They managed to get free. They were pretty shaken up when they got to the bar.”

The next day the same two young men grabbed a chainsaw, threw it into the back of a car and blocked a property to rescue an elderly man trapped in his house on the fire.

The Laherty-Hunts are staying with friends for now, but they plan to rebuild their home.

“We had a lot of people offer to help us,” says Jamie. “When things get bad here, people always step in to help. But it will be a long road to recovery.”

Ann spends her first moments back on her property sifting through the debris. He finds a pair of metal goblets under a piece of burnt tin, an untouched canoe in the garage, and a baking dish with a lid.

Then, deep in the rubble, a rare and valuable treasure. Two small clay sculptures he made years ago, including a painted brown owl, are completely intact.

“Oh my God,” he says. “That made me so happy. My ugly clay work survived. I didn’t think anything could do that.”

Jamie hugs his wife and kisses her on the forehead.

“Small wins matter,” he says.

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