Alec Gellis
Appearances
The Viall Files
E867 - Los Angeles Fires, Traitors w/ Dorinda Medley, Heidi Montag Hits No 1, RHOSLC, and Special Forces
I appreciate it. Yeah. Nice to meet everybody. Thanks for having me on.
The Viall Files
E867 - Los Angeles Fires, Traitors w/ Dorinda Medley, Heidi Montag Hits No 1, RHOSLC, and Special Forces
What's up, guys? How's everybody? Nice to meet everybody.
The Viall Files
E867 - Los Angeles Fires, Traitors w/ Dorinda Medley, Heidi Montag Hits No 1, RHOSLC, and Special Forces
Definitely. Yeah. Yeah. I appreciate it. It's been a wild couple months and, uh,
The Viall Files
E867 - Los Angeles Fires, Traitors w/ Dorinda Medley, Heidi Montag Hits No 1, RHOSLC, and Special Forces
Yeah. So about three months ago, there was a fire in Malibu, one house burned on Malibu Road. And then the next month, there was a Franklin fire that kind of ripped through. It came into Sarah Retreat. Where I live was kind of like ground zero. So We were prepared with the pumps and the pools and those gas powered generators and were able to put out the fires here at our place.
The Viall Files
E867 - Los Angeles Fires, Traitors w/ Dorinda Medley, Heidi Montag Hits No 1, RHOSLC, and Special Forces
And then the neighbor's houses, Patrick Dempsey's, Dick Van Dyke and a couple other people. And that Franklin fire burned through all the brush here. And then so when the Palisades fire came, it ripped through the Palisades up to Malibu and it basically stopped everything. burning when it got into my neighborhood because everything had already burned. But it came through Kelly's.
The Viall Files
E867 - Los Angeles Fires, Traitors w/ Dorinda Medley, Heidi Montag Hits No 1, RHOSLC, and Special Forces
I was over there, did everything that I could to put it out. It was so much wind, so much ember, so much fire. There wasn't anything I could do. There was no oxygen in the air. So I basically just had to get out of there.
The Viall Files
E867 - Los Angeles Fires, Traitors w/ Dorinda Medley, Heidi Montag Hits No 1, RHOSLC, and Special Forces
Yes. So these wildfires in Malibu, they happen every 10 years or so. I mean, there's historically always been these crazy fires that come through. So the people that have been residents for a while know that you got to be prepared. And if you can stay and put out spot fires as embers land in trees and bushes, you can a lot of the time save your home.
The Viall Files
E867 - Los Angeles Fires, Traitors w/ Dorinda Medley, Heidi Montag Hits No 1, RHOSLC, and Special Forces
And a lot of people were able to save their homes. I've been seeing a lot of really cool videos of people with their hoses, with the pumps saving their homes. But sometimes too much fire comes through and there's just it's just not something that you can stay through. So it got to a point where I'm there. It's like.
The Viall Files
E867 - Los Angeles Fires, Traitors w/ Dorinda Medley, Heidi Montag Hits No 1, RHOSLC, and Special Forces
literally like a blizzard of like murder hornets that are on fire just like stinging me oh man and uh i and there's i can't breathe um i'm suffocating so i just basically sprinted to my car oh that's so scary did you incur any injuries at all while fighting these fires No, no injuries, luckily.
The Viall Files
E867 - Los Angeles Fires, Traitors w/ Dorinda Medley, Heidi Montag Hits No 1, RHOSLC, and Special Forces
Was she also there? So, yeah, so we were up at her place. We basically just, like, watered it down. We were just kind of, like, spraying all the hedges and, like, the roof and everything and just making sure it was all soaking wet. Then if a fire came, it would, like, an ember lands on it. It just goes out right away. Sure.
The Viall Files
E867 - Los Angeles Fires, Traitors w/ Dorinda Medley, Heidi Montag Hits No 1, RHOSLC, and Special Forces
And when the fire came over the hill, it got too close and she just didn't feel safe. So I just drove her over to my place really quick and then came back. And the cops almost didn't let me in. I had to fight two cops. I got in a screaming argument with two cops to get back in. And one of them chased me back up to the house. And eventually it was just like, dude, you're fucking crazy.
The Viall Files
E867 - Los Angeles Fires, Traitors w/ Dorinda Medley, Heidi Montag Hits No 1, RHOSLC, and Special Forces
And just left. And... Basically, yeah, that's what happened.
The Viall Files
E867 - Los Angeles Fires, Traitors w/ Dorinda Medley, Heidi Montag Hits No 1, RHOSLC, and Special Forces
She got some stuff out, but pretty much lost everything. And it was a really special cottage that she was renting. And she kind of has this really epic fairy vibe, creative. And it was just such a special place to chill. And it was her dream home that she'd been seeing, driving in and out of Malibu for years. And then just kind of happened to end up being able to rent it. And...
The Viall Files
E867 - Los Angeles Fires, Traitors w/ Dorinda Medley, Heidi Montag Hits No 1, RHOSLC, and Special Forces
She'd only been there since April. So it's just like super devastating. So she's really sad. Just been trying to like stay positive and kind of look to the future and avoid looking in the rear view mirror and just see all the opportunities going forward and like all the cool travel possibilities and like trying to just kind of like see like the like blue ocean ahead.
The Viall Files
E867 - Los Angeles Fires, Traitors w/ Dorinda Medley, Heidi Montag Hits No 1, RHOSLC, and Special Forces
It's super crazy here. So the challenge with Malibu is there's so many regulatory agencies that make it almost impossible to rebuild your home. So there's many homes that haven't even been able to be rebuilt since Woolsey Fire. So especially these houses on the beach, are especially difficult to build.
The Viall Files
E867 - Los Angeles Fires, Traitors w/ Dorinda Medley, Heidi Montag Hits No 1, RHOSLC, and Special Forces
So most of these houses are from the 70s or even earlier, and they're people that are older who have the tax basis from a long time ago. So they probably won't be able to rebuild. Most of them are underinsured or the insurance dropped them because they're the area is so fire prone. So most of these people really like lost everything and it may take a decade or more for them to rebuild.
The Viall Files
E867 - Los Angeles Fires, Traitors w/ Dorinda Medley, Heidi Montag Hits No 1, RHOSLC, and Special Forces
So essentially it's just a complete loss because they won't be able to sustain holding the property. So it's hard to tell what's going to happen to a lot of these homes. Probably they're just going to turn into like mega billionaire compounds that's going to be like kind of crazy. But yeah, it's really going to change the community a lot, especially in that area.
The Viall Files
E867 - Los Angeles Fires, Traitors w/ Dorinda Medley, Heidi Montag Hits No 1, RHOSLC, and Special Forces
And so the half of Malibu that burned was the half that didn't burn in Woolsey. So it's just like, whoa, man.
The Viall Files
E867 - Los Angeles Fires, Traitors w/ Dorinda Medley, Heidi Montag Hits No 1, RHOSLC, and Special Forces
Yeah.
The Viall Files
E867 - Los Angeles Fires, Traitors w/ Dorinda Medley, Heidi Montag Hits No 1, RHOSLC, and Special Forces
Yeah. So we had like these like fire hoses and we like soaked our house and the Franklin fire was a whole nother beast. So it was like, It was just going through the brush. It wasn't catching houses on fire. So the embers that landed were much easier to put out. There wasn't as much fire. There wasn't as much force or wind behind the fires.
The Viall Files
E867 - Los Angeles Fires, Traitors w/ Dorinda Medley, Heidi Montag Hits No 1, RHOSLC, and Special Forces
So I was able to do a lot of good at neighbors' houses with just their garden hoses or their sprinklers. Or one neighbor had a fire hose pool system like we did. And It was much easier. But with this, it's like a house catches on fire with like levels and so many layers of like wood and different materials. It's like that's not going to get put out with a with a with a hose garden hose. Yeah.
The Viall Files
E867 - Los Angeles Fires, Traitors w/ Dorinda Medley, Heidi Montag Hits No 1, RHOSLC, and Special Forces
Definitely. Yeah, please go to her Instagram. It's at Kelly Lauren and her links in her bio. And the GoFundMe is help Kelly rebuild from the Palisades fire. Okay.
The Viall Files
E867 - Los Angeles Fires, Traitors w/ Dorinda Medley, Heidi Montag Hits No 1, RHOSLC, and Special Forces
yeah I mean it's so important just to live with gratitude and just be positive enjoy every moment because it can all change so fast and um and also it's an opportunity just to break the routine and be flexible and like I mean that in a way that's like not insensitive and I mean it's just tough because so many people's dream homes were in LA that they that they got but um
The Viall Files
E867 - Los Angeles Fires, Traitors w/ Dorinda Medley, Heidi Montag Hits No 1, RHOSLC, and Special Forces
Yeah, I hope everyone can just, you know, stay strong and stay positive that they're alive and just be free to go forward with their future with nothing holding them back if they lost something. Yeah.