Fourteen-year-old Ruben Navarrete, with just two-days of a crash course in driving, drove his wheelchair-bound brother to escape the deadly wildfire raging through California, AFP reported. Ruben lives with his uncle Joshua Smith and aunt Jamie in the Cold Springs Rancheria of Mono Indians of California,  a Native American reserve threatened by the Creek Fire. 

As of late Thursday, the Creek Fire had razed 176,000 acres in the hills of the Sierra National Forest in central California, according to Cal Fire officials.

The family had two days to prepare for a possible evacuation, and in that brief time, his aunt and uncle managed to show him some basics of driving.

“It’s like a video game, Ruben,” his uncle told him. 

On Monday at midnight, as flames approached their home, the family — Ruben, his uncle and aunt, their three children and Ruben’s wheelchair-bound brother, had to evacuate immediately, on their three cars.

Aunt Jamie led the pack driving the family Kia SUV, followed by Ruben in a Chevrolet with his brother at his side. Uncle Josh took up the rear driving a pickup truck with busted front lights.

“When it came down to when I had to drive, I was really nervous, scared,” Ruben told AFP

The flames were moving right behind the small convoy.

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“I didn’t want to look because I was so focused, I didn’t want to crash or anything,” he said.

But if you looked out the side window there was “a really big steep hill,” he recalled.

Ruben said that he started feeling comfortable behind the wheel only halfway into the 20-mile trip.

His aunt congratulated Ruben for a job well done.

“It was a crash course because all he had ever driven was about a quarter-mile from our home,” she said, laughing.

“It was really nerve-racking for all of us,” she told AFP.

The family has been lodged at a hotel in Clovis, where they can stay for 10 days, courtesy Red Cross. 

Normally evacuees are sheltered in places like school gyms and sleep on cots, but that is presently unsafe due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Ruben’s aunt tried not to talk about the fate of their home, or what happened to the two dogs they had to leave behind. They’re unable to anticipate the damage the fire would have possibly done to their home. 

In the hotel room, she spreads some blankets, which she brought from home, on the bed to try to give the room a homelike atmosphere.

The fires have burned 2.6 million acres of land in California, as on Thursday. 

Across the US West Coast, 15 people have been killed in the fire and half a million have fled their homes, AFP reported.