2020 continues to be a challenging year for everyone at the VMTH and in our communities. On top of the roadblocks we have overcome surrounding the pandemic, we are now being faced with additional adversity in wildfires that are threatening our communities. The recent LNU Lightning Complex Fire affected many of our team personally, with several faculty, staff, and students having to evacuate their homes. We are thankful that no one was hurt. Kudos to our clinical teams for treating 35 animals in the VMTH and assisting VERT in evaluating, triaging, and/or treating more than 1,000 animals at evacuation centers and sheltering in place at ranches in the fire zone. This field-first approach allowed the school to prioritize its response and treat as many animals as possible without further stressing VMTH resources. Along with others from hospital leadership, I had the pleasure of taking Dean Lairmore on a tour of the burned animals being treated in the hospital. He was impressed with your compassionate care of not only the animals, but of the clients, many of whom lost everything. He extended his compliments and gratitude to everyone for going above and beyond in the face of such tragedy. We anticipate additional fire response into the fall, as many fires are currently raging throughout the state. (We have been placed on standby for the North Complex Fire near Oroville at the time of this newsletter’s publication.) If any of you are feeling overwhelmed at this time, I encourage you to speak to your supervisor and also to utilize the services of Florence Soares-Dabalos, the hospital’s wellness counselor. She is not only an advocate for our clients, but for you as well. As always, stay strong. Eventually, we will get through this.