PARADISE, Calif. - For those leaving Paradise, a statue resembling hope has become a common stop.
Jesse Groeschen from Trinidad carved a Phoenix out of a 6-foot-tall tree stump. The property owner, Deborah Yoder, said PG&E accidentally chopped down the 150-year-old pine tree.
Yoder, who lost everything in the Camp Fire, knew she wanted to take a mistake and make it into something beautiful.
"She totally thought of the idea and she did reach out to me and said she wanted a Phoenix," said Jesse Groeschen "So, just the Phoenix is associated with hope."
"I thought about what this tree has watched over. This tree has been here since Paradise was incorporated, it has been here before the Skyway was built and then it was here on November 8th," said Yoder. "You can see from its location it watched over everybody as they were escaping out of Paradise and I thought it just needed something special to be made with it."
The Phoenix bird represents being born again and rising from the ashes.
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