Ash Level is AN ATLADENA NATIVE AND the founder of Altadena Rising, an organisation born from the Eaton Fire that is focused on empowering survivors and filling the gaps that outside institutions consistently miss. Nicole Huguenin is part of Maui Rapid Response, a hub within a wider network of organisations that has been doing care at scale since the Lahaina fire and through four major storms since.

Both of them stepped into leadership not because they wanted to, but because their communities needed someone who actually knew them to stand up. Both are still going, long after the cameras moved on.

In this episode, Ash and Nicole join Jennifer Gray Thompson to talk about what emergent community-led recovery actually looks like from the inside: the historical distrust that shapes how their communities receive outside help, why institutional systems consistently fail the most vulnerable, how they navigate funders who want KPIs for work that cannot always be quantified, and what it costs personally to show up every day for people in the worst moments of their lives.

They also talk about Kuleana, the Hawaiian concept of collective responsibility to care for the land, family, and community, what it means to triage by trauma, why being a reliable narrator is the foundation of staying power, and what it looked like for Nicole to visit Altadena and finally begin processing grief she had been carrying since Lahaina.

This is a conversation about care, community, and what real recovery requires of the people who refuse to walk away.

Resources:

• How to Disaster
• Learn more about After the Fire USA
• After the Fire USA Resource Library
• Altadena Rising on Instagram
• Maui Rapid Response
• Cultural Fire Management Council
• Connect with Jennifer Gray Thompson on LinkedIn

Produced by NOVA

In this episode, Jennifer Gray Thompson speaks with Tyler Freres about what it can mean to rebuild with wood after a megafire. Tyler shares the story of his family’s long-standing timber business in Oregon’s Santiam Canyon, how the Beachie Creek Fire affected both the community and their forestland, and why the recovery of burned timber matters for local economies, land restoration, and future resilience.

The conversation also looks at mass timber and mass plywood panels, including how engineered wood can perform in fire, earthquakes, high wind events, and other hazards when it is designed thoughtfully. Tyler explains why many assumptions about wood, steel, concrete, and fire resistance are more complicated than they first appear, and how prefabricated wood systems can help buildings go up more efficiently.

Throughout the episode, Jennifer and Tyler return to a larger question: how do we care for forests, communities, and rebuilding in ways that are practical, ecologically responsible, and hopeful? Listeners will come away with a clearer understanding of forest management, fire-safe construction, and the possibility that beauty and resilience do not have to be treated as opposites.

Resources:

• How to Disaster
• Learn more about After the Fire USA
• After the Fire USA Resource Library
• Freres Engineered Wood
• Connect with Jennifer Gray Thompson on LinkedIn

Produced by NOVA

In this episode of How to Disaster, Jennifer Gray Thompson speaks with cartoonist and author Brian Fies about A Fire Story, his graphic memoir about losing his home in the 2017 Tubbs Fire. Brian shares how the book began in the first days after the fire, when he was still trying to understand what had happened while also documenting it with the eyes of a storyteller.

Their conversation moves through the realities of disaster recovery: walking through a destroyed neighborhood, navigating insurance, rebuilding, accepting help, and learning what people actually need in the aftermath. Brian also reflects on the role of block captains, neighbors, local leadership, and the quiet ways communities begin to organize when everything familiar has been disrupted.

Jennifer and Brian also talk about memory, art, humor, grief, and the strange mix of loss and connection that can follow disaster. This episode offers a grounded look at what it means to survive, rebuild, and carry both the old life and the new one forward.

Resources:

• How to Disaster
• Learn more about After the Fire USA
• After the Fire USA Resource Library
• LA Rising Podcast with Kim Marshall
• Watch Duty App
• A Fire Story by Brian Fies
• Community Brigade Malibu
• Connect with Jennifer Gray Thompson on LinkedIn

Produced by NOVA: https://novapodcasting.com