Bonney Lake police chief and family among evacuees during Sumner Grade wildfire
When it came time to evacuate Bryan Jeter’s Bonney Lake home the evening of Sept. 8, he was as anxious as anyone might be with a wildfire threatening to engulf his neighborhood.
“Whenever you’re being evacuated, you do have some nerves,” Jeter said Sept. 9. “Trying to grab what you think is important.”
Unlike most, Jeter is paid to keep his nerves in check. He’s the Chief of Police for the Pierce County city of 21,000 people.
Jeter’s home survived but four homes did not in the Sumner Grade fire. The fire had consumed 800 acres.
Jeter was in the emergency operations center around 5 p.m. Sept 8 when he and other officials gave the order to evacuate the Sky Island development, west of state Route 410. Only his wife, Andra, was home at the time.
“The fire was right below our house, and it was definitely moving fast once it jumped 410,” he said. “It brought a whole new sense of urgency to our team and our evacuation efforts because we saw how quickly it spread up that hill.”
With the help of the couple’s son, daughter and a friend, Andra grabbed what she could.
“She’s my hero,” Jeter said of his wife. The couple relocated to their daughter’s home.
Jeter left the emergency operations center to help in the last moments of evacuating his home, he said.
With the fire only 20 percent contained, many evacuees are not yet being allowed home.
“We’d sure love to get everybody back in their homes, but we don’t want to go through the evacuation process again,” Jeter said. “It’s too emotional and too strenuous on them.”
During a tour of the devastation Sept. 9 with Gov. Jay Inslee, Jeter made it clear that it took a team effort to save people and homes.
“Everybody would love to have more resources, but the first responders, their efforts have been nothing short of heroic out there,” Jeter said.
The fire is unprecedented in Jeter’s 32 years in law enforcement, he said.
“2020 and 32 years, I have a lot of firsts,” Jeter said. “It’s just been an incredible year, but I’ve never never seen anything like this.”
This story was originally published September 10, 2020 at 5:00 AM.
