Russell Allevato, 45, of Southgate, Michigan, was traveling from Las Vegas to Los Angeles with his two teenage daughters, his nephew and his nephew's girlfriend.
"It was total smoke and all the cars just started to stack and the fire got closer to us, and everyone started running up the hill," he said. "Hundreds and hundreds of people running up the hill."
Their rental car was among those destroyed.
"All our stuff was charred and gone," Allevato said by phone as he rode in the back of a California Highway Patrol vehicle.