"What?!!" asked Sean, slamming on the brakes.
"Look!" I pointed over the treetops to our right, where a mound of flames, brilliantly orange against the purply black sky, sent up a billowing column of smoke. The flames licked well above the tops of the trees.
"Where is it?" asked Sean as he started roaring down Calhoun. "Let's find it...I may need to get a camera." We crossed 13th Street and started heading down Greene. I rolled down my window and raindrops hit my face as I kept looking down to my right. 12th, 11th, 10th, 9th...we kept getting closer. "I'm getting a camera."
We whipped to our left toward the Augusta Chronicle building, just as a firetruck, lights blazing, sirened past us. We drove down to the rear photo entrance. As Sean went upstairs, I waited in the car, then another car drove up. It was Annette, fresh from shooting Cirque de la Symphonie. As Sean came back down the stairs, he and Annette decided to swap places--she'd head out to the fire while he edited her images and alerted the newsroom.
Inside the crowded, creative space of Photo, Sean answered the "bleee-eeep" of his phone and confirmed to the night editor that Annette would be covering the fire. Annette called back to report that she'd found it...most of the historic Southern Milling Co. was engulfed in flames. Sean said, "Get what you can."
I paced while Sean flipped through Annette's photos of acrobats twisting and bending and tossing rings to the music of the Augusta Symphony, part of this year's Westobou Festival. Chris called next; he'd heard about the fire and would head over too. Just as Sean finished making his photo edits, the door slammed. "Annette!"
She was back, one of the first journalists on the ground before the police and firemen pushed everyone back. Her images of the water arcing from the fully extended firetruck's ladder, lit by the glow of the thirsting flames, with a hose curling on the street in the foreground, emphasized the magnitude of the fire. According to Annette, the brick section of the mill was fine, but the entire rest of it--a wooden structure still containing combustible chemicals and other fire food--had gone up.
We left to do a little looking of our own. The street was entirely blocked by fire engines and police cars...the lights could be seen from blocks away. The fire was still glowing, although tempered by the continuous spray of water.
We came home then, still full and tired but with adrenaline pumping. "That was fun," I said, smiling at my husband. All in a day's work.
P.S. Here's the link to the story and photo.
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