Zuni family loses home to fire, pueblo donates trailer
Lebeck Ukestine and grandson Joel Gchachi, 10, stand in front of a new mobile home donated with the help of people in the Zuni community and the Zuni Housing Authority. By sheer serendipity, Gchachi saved his sleeping grandfather as fire swept through their home. Gchachi had set out walking to school and came back home to ask his grandfather for a ride. All their belongings and family mementos were turned to ash. "The only thing they carried from the fire was what was the clothes on their backs," Zuni Housing Authority Director Michael Chavez said. © 2011 Gallup Independent / Adron Gardner

By Vida Volkert
Staff writer

ZUNI — Joel Gchachu felt it was too cold for him and his little brother to walk to school the morning of May 11 and decided to go back to his grandfather’s home and ask for a ride. That 10-year-old boy’s last minute change of mind would save the lives of his cousin and grandfather.

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