He owned a fleet of lovingly restored vintage cars. They were melted in the Coffey Park firestorm.

The above photo shows Scott Birdsall's 1962 Buick, which he bought at age 19 and fully restored, before and after the devastating Tubbs Fire, which tore through his Coffey Park neighborhood in October. The above photo shows Scott Birdsall's 1962 Buick, which he bought at age 19 and fully restored, before and after the devastating Tubbs Fire, which tore through his Coffey Park neighborhood in October. Photo: Courtesy Scott Birdsall Photo: Courtesy Scott Birdsall Image 1 of / 8 Caption Close He owned a fleet of lovingly restored vintage cars. They were melted in the Coffey Park firestorm. 1 / 8 Back to Gallery

Scott Birdsall and his wife were asleep in their Santa Rosa home when the fire started. They awoke not to the sounds of sirens or banging on their door, but to the wailing of 80-mph winds that rattled the windows and shook the cars parked out front.

The blaze was less than a block from their house when Birdsall and his family fled. When Birdsall returned days later, like so many other Coffey Park residents, he found his home and belongings reduced to ash and rubble.

Among the detritus was his fleet of vintage cars. Birdsall, the owner of hot-rod shop Chuckles Garage, shared photos on his garage's Instagram page of the cars before the fire, and after. The post-fire images show heaps of crunched steel, stained a fuzzy reddish-brown and melted beyond recognition.

Story continues below.

Birdsall's never-driven 1962 Buick Wildcat, which he bought at age 19, remained standing in the ruins of his garage and home shop. Two-hundred feet across the way was the 1997 Dodge truck he used for towing. And he found his 1963 Farilane 500 hardtop – a present to his wife following the birth of their daughter – flipped upside down in the space where once his bedroom stood.

"The cars are an absolute loss," he said. "You couldn't take a bolt off of them. Some were just puddles of aluminum."

Only one of the cars sitting on Birdsall's lot on the night of the fire made it out unscathed – the getaway vehicle.

"It was our leased Honda sedan," Birdsall said, the only car easily accessible for his 81-year-old mother.

Michelle Robertson is an SFGATE staff writer. Email her at mrobertson@sfchronicle.com or find her on Twitter at @mrobertsonsf.