Steve Rasmussen lives far enough into the wilderness around the Napa Valley, about a mile from the town of Calistoga, that his phone bristles with apps. Apps that track everything from the weather to helicopter flight paths to fire flare ups. Why? Since he and his wife bought the 796-acre vineyard and woodland property in 2015, he’s been through five fires.
The first was among the October 2017 wine country fires that consumed more than 100,000 acres. That year, California saw just how bad it could get when 80 mile per hour gusts, combined with fuel-heavy underbrush, drought and climate change, created four major fires spreading across two counties over three weeks. Most Napa Valley folks now refer to those 2017 infernos as “the wake-up call.”
Rasmussen’s property, called Palisades Canyon, escaped one of those 2017 infernos, the Tubbs Fire, but wasn’t so lucky three years later, when 90% of his acreage burned. So when the PickettFire flared up on August 21, 2025, the brainy and bubbly 73-year-old vintner, and the county’s fire responders, were ready.
Barn roof line today mirrored in Glass Fire image on the phone. Photo: Afsoon Razavi…