And There I Was... The Story Of The Burning Cadillac

Once I really decided to get into photography and bought my 35mm Minolta XD-11, man-oh-man that thing was just about glued to my face. I took it everywhere I went and I went everywhere just so I could take it, and of course snap a few pictures along the way. I have been scanning my old photos taken with this camera for some time now (years actually - I have thousands of pics) - and ya know what? I actually took some cool photos along the way. Some of them were cool, but with a not so happy story behind them. Case in point.

It was Sunday, 11 Feb 1979. I had been in the Air Force all of 5 months and getting to know the area around my new air base - George AFB, Victorville, CA. I took a quick drive up to the mountains near the base and checked out Big Bear Lake. "Nice but very touristy" I thought and wasn't too interested in it. On the way down the mountain I stopped at a scenic overlook...

...I snapped this one lone picture from the scenic overlook when I heard screams from below. I couldn't see anything because of the way the roads serpentine tightly against the hillsides.

I got in the car, drove down the road, and turned a tight corner whereupon I came across this sight and parked the car! This pic was snapped immediately after exiting my car. I caught it just as the tank blew!

Now I'm walking toward the infernal and the screaming I heard is hysterical

No one that had parked their cars had fire extinguishers in theim, so the Caddy just burned.

I had gone up to a couple that appeared to be in their '40s and started talking. Apparently they were on their way up to Big Bear when the car caught fire! Fortunately no one was hurt but the wife was in hysterics - thus the loud screaming - and the husband was somewhat in disbelief. But again, no one was hurt so that was good, it was just an unfortunate incident.

Totalled!