Gary Hall Jr prays to find a puddle. It’s the best he can hope for, a week after the retired swimmer looked at the hills above Pacific Palisades and saw a plume of smoke. About ten minutes later, an alert sounded on his phone. There was a fire and evacuations were underway, the message said. It was a little late.
Hall had already seen a ‘wall’ of flames tumbling towards his house. He had already grabbed his dog and was dodging the falling embers to get to his car. He had already begun to ride through the “apocalypse” that was engulfing Los Angeles.
“People stopped on the sidewalks and tried to drive around other cars, blowing through stop signs and red lights. It was terror, absolute fear in the faces. Despair,” he says.
“The black smoke was so thick they couldn’t even see the side mirrors of their car.” Other people fled on foot. “They didn’t know whether they were running towards the flames or away from them.” Those flames destroyed his home and stole almost everything he had worked for.
He had just three minutes to escape – enough time to grab a painting from his grandfather, a gift from his daughter and his dog.
But the 50-year-old was forced to flee before he could claim the 10 Olympic medals he won between 1996 and 2004. He has vowed to return to Pacific Palisades armed with a shovel and the spirit of the 49ers.
Olympic champion Gary Hall Jr. lost his home and his ten medals in the Los Angeles wildfires

The Pacific Palisades area has been devastated by deadly wildfires in recent days

In heartbreaking footage, Hall shared a video of the spot where his home once stood
“I might find a melted puddle of Olympic medals: gold, silver and bronze,” Hall says. But he doesn’t have much hope. “I don’t think there’s a chance.”
Neighbors sneaked in to see the destruction; Hall shared a clip of where he once lived and taught swimming. It’s now a pile of rubble, bent pipes and burned out stuff. “They say there’s nothing there,” he says. “It’s like a puddle of black.” And the damage isn’t done yet.
The fires have already claimed 25 lives, but Los Angeles is still burning. It is one of the most devastating natural disasters the area has ever experienced. For Hall, it is the latest trauma of a life that oscillates between the extraordinary and the barely believable.
As a young man, he overcame type 1 diabetes, won five gold medals and became one of the pole’s most charismatic figures.
In 2006, he wrestled, punched and kicked a blacktip reef shark after it bit his younger sister. They only escaped after she shot him with a spear. Hall has been injured in a few car wrecks and has also survived numerous hurricanes. “I’m questioning God’s intentions right now,” he says.
“If you have a near-death experience… it certainly affects your view of life, its fragility and its meaning,” Hall continues. ‘What is the value of our lives and our things?’
A week after fleeing his home, the 50-year-old is living with his sister a few hours south of Los Angeles. He’s taken a few baby steps back to normal life: “My first purchase was a toothbrush,” Hall says. “About two days later, deodorant.” He now also has more underwear and socks.
He has canceled utility payments and completed FEMA applications; A GoFundMe pagefounded by his sister, has raised more than $80,000. But what comes next for his life and his coaching business Sea Monkeys Swimming? “So many questions,” Hall says.
He’s still trying to process this last layer of trauma. There are some things he can’t explain: “It will be some time before I can express how awesome this forest fire was,” he says.

“I’m questioning God’s intentions at the moment,” the former Olympic swimmer told Mail Sport

Hall won ten Olympic medals, including two gold and two silver at the 1996 Atlanta Games

Police cars are seen guarding homes torched during the California disaster
There are countless more that it will never replace. The IOC has offered ten more Olympic medals, but he will not find a new 1962 Volkswagen Kombi, his first car in which he made road trips along the Atlantic and Pacific coasts. “It was part of my identity,” he says. It was visible on that video. “Crushed, melted,” Hall says. ‘Heartbreaking.’
Hall collected a souvenir when swimming took him somewhere new. Works of art, antiques, furniture. “Every piece in my house… had a story. A history.’ Like the leather Chesterfield sofa – one of his children, Gigi, had her name scrawled in a hidden corner. “I can get a new Chesterfield,” Hall says, his voice beginning to shake. “But it won’t be the one with my daughter’s signature on it.”
The 50-year-old speaks from the front seat of a car and at one point briefly interrupts the call. There’s a grim irony in the reason why: his cell phone started overheating.
****
Within a minute, the plume of smoke had doubled in size. Within another 60 seconds the wind had ‘loaded’ the flames down the hill. “I immediately called my girlfriend,” he says. “The fire department will put it out,” Hall told her. He was wrong.
Moments later, Hall was collecting items from the door. The first thing he grabbed? The portrait. “I loved my grandfather more than anyone,” Hall says. He picked up the religious artifact – given to him by his daughter – his dog Puddles, some dog food and some insulin.
“The next stop would have been a small safe in my bedroom closet that had the medals in it, a collection of nice watches (and) jewelry.” But time was running out. He drove to the village of Pacific Palisades and realized that many people were “oblivious” to what was happening.
“Some people watched it and filmed it,” he says. ‘Children playing in the park with their babysitter. And then, when the wall of fire came over the hill… everyone ran for their lives. It was chaos.’
Soon? “People trapped in their cars on Sunset (Boulevard) were getting fire from both sides,” Hall said. “You can imagine the desperation of a parent when their children go to school five blocks away.” His girlfriend’s house was also destroyed.

“To me, they represent resilience,” Hall Jr. said. about the Olympic medals he lost in the disaster

The deadly fires have killed at least 25 people as firefighters struggled to control them

Thousands of homes have been destroyed by the flames in the Pacific Palisades neighborhood
“She couldn’t see the car in front of her,” Hall said. What was visible? “Women are running, holding their children, breathing in this black smoke and just screaming.” The fire now blocked both main roads into the city.
“Cars were stuck and had nowhere to go.” Fortunately, Hall knew a way back and his partner escaped. “Every other car on Sunset was burning.”
Hall’s sister had the foresight to book him a hotel room – before everyone else had the same idea. Check-in was ‘creepy’ as locals arrived with their belongings, their pets and a ‘wild’ look at what they had seen.
“Many of them knew their homes were gone,” he says. ‘The desperation was so real.’ As night fell, the streets of Santa Monica became increasingly crowded. Many people slept in their cars. And all this while there was ‘just’ a black cloud hanging above us. “It’s not like nighttime,” Hall says. “It’s something much darker.”
He just stopped by to pick up a toothbrush and an emergency prescription. Without needles for his insulin, he couldn’t eat.
A week later, Hall is still having trouble sleeping. The flashbacks, the nightmares. More trauma. Nearly two decades have passed since that spearfishing trip off the Florida Keys when a six-foot shark took a chunk out of his sister’s arm.
Hall was forced to kick him and punch him in the nose; Bebe shot him as he charged at her with his mouth open.
The retired swimmer regularly flirted with tragedy while living in Florida during hurricane season, when “my whole house is shaking, I’m afraid the roof is going to come off, trees are going to fly through my car.” All these experiences – the Olympics, the sharks, the car wrecks, the hurricanes – come with lessons.
“Comfort in chaos,” says Hall. “Everything slows down and you feel very alive… there’s something darkly attractive or alluring about it.”

In 2006, Hall and his sister were attacked by a blacktip reef shark off the coast of Florida

In addition to his success in the pool, Hall also became one of swimming’s most charismatic figures
Unfortunately, that doesn’t pay for a new house. Hall is among those who lost State Farm’s fire insurance last year.
“When you need them most, they will deny and deny and deny… they make extremely difficult times harder,” he says. ‘Everyone knows meIt will be a disaster.’
Fortunately, support is coming from elsewhere. From good friends and people he hasn’t seen in twenty years. They have offered clothing, a place to stay and 10 new medals.
“They are, in some ways, a nice souvenir from some of the swim meets from long ago,” Hall says. But? “To me, they represent resilience…how we respond, and if we can triumph and persevere through countless adversities and trials, this is what life is all about.”
Hall is committed to returning every message of support. He’s not the only one who needs help.
‘The average age of clients at Sea Monkeys Swimming is two to six years old, he says. “Watching a five-year-old child try to understand that their entire life – as they knew it – is over,” he says. ‘What are God’s purposes in this? TBD, I guess.”