A flight attendant who survived the Las Vegas mass shooting only to have her California home destroyed by wildfire has spoken out about her odds-defying ordeal.
Michella Flores, a 51-year-old former firefighter and paramedic, kept working multiple jobs without taking a day off through a shooting that killed 58 and wildfires that have killed 38 so far.
‘Last Sunday, I was running from bullets,’ Flores told KTVU. ‘This Sunday, I was running from fire.’
Flores had flown in to Las Vegas on the morning of October 1, a Sunday, and was waiting for her next job on a flight on Monday night.
She stayed at the Hooters Hotel, which offers discounts to flight crews, right across the street from the Route 91 Harvest festival.
Michella Flores, a 51-year-old former firefighter and paramedic, kept working multiple jobs without taking a day off through the Las Vegas massacre and fires that destroyed her home
The Santa Rosa home where Flores lived with her parents was destroyed by the fire
A longtime country music fan with nothing better to do in Sin City, Flores wandered over and was watching Jason Aldean perform from the sidewalk of Las Vegas Boulevard when shots rang out overhead.
‘That’s when everybody started screaming and coming out of the festival screaming, ‘Shooter!” Flores told CNN. ‘I ran down Las Vegas Boulevard.’
Flores took cover in the conference room of a nearby casino, barricading herself inside with other festival-goers and waiting in terror for the all-clear hours later.
‘You’re sitting there waiting for someone to open the door and be shot,’ she said. ‘It drove me nuts.’
When she returned to her hotel, the bodies on the trash-strewn festival grounds were visible from her window.
Flores didn’t sleep that night, but she had a job to do the next day on a flight to Boston, and she worked the next four days straight.
Flores was watching Jason Aldean perform from the sidewalk of Las Vegas Boulevard when shots rang out overhead. Concertgoers are seen fleeing the shooting in this file photo
When she finally returned home to Santa Rosa, California, she knew there were fires nearby, thanks to a second job as a ground support technician for non-commercial flights, including those used by the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.
‘I knew we were short-staffed,’ Flores said. ‘We were getting fuel loads for Cal Fire and we need to keep those trucks moving.’
When she got home from work on October 7, she could see the glow of the fire approaching her parent’s home, where she is living while in the process of moving.
She warned her parents to pack and took her dog to a nearby park, where she was listening to a local fire dispatch frequency when she heard the name of her parent’s street crackle over the airwaves.
‘I called my mom,’ Flores said, ‘and my mom screamed in the phone and said, ‘It’s at the bottom of our driveway.”
Flores warned her parents to pack and took her dog to a nearby park, where she was listening to a local fire dispatch frequency when she heard the name of her parent’s street
Flores raced home and battled the flames with a garden hose, side by side with local fire crews.
At around 4am the next day, things seemed under control and she left for another job at the Oakland airport.
By the time her shift was over, her parent’s rental house had been completely destroyed by the flames.
‘Almost everything I own is gone,’ she told KTVU. ‘My bed, my bike, my clothes, my flight attendant uniforms.’
Luckily, her parents and her dog are alright. They’re all temporarily staying in the rental that Flores had been preparing to move into.
Flores, who has worked through both crises without taking a day off, says that she’s focused on taking care of business.
‘Believe me. This will hit me,’ she said. ‘And it will hit me hard.’
‘Right now, I’m in this space where things need to get done. And I’ll deal with the rest later on.’