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Parma woman's mom still missing in California wildfires

It's been two weeks and a day since the California wildfires destroyed the mobile home park where Sheila Santos lives.

Parma — A Parma family is holding out hope that Sheila Santos is still alive.

It's been two weeks and a day since the California wildfires destroyed the mobile home park where she lives.

"It’s like a war zone," Jayne Konicki told WKYC from her Parma home.

Sheila's daughter Tammie Konicki drove 56 hours from Independence to Paradise, California. She left Nov 9. Now, two weeks later, the search continues for 64-year-old Sheila. who means so much to so many..

The remains of 14 bodies were found in Santos’ mobile home park. Tammie says the coroner has a body believed to be Sheila, but they are all waiting on DNA confirmation.

This family not giving up hope for a second until they know.

"She could be in the hospital, at a shelter not knowing how to get ahold of people, or a burn unit somewhere," Tammie said via FaceTime from Paradise.

“Paradise went to hell in the matter of a morning,” Jayne said. "They are shifting through things just trying to find bones of people. To think that that could be your mother? I can’t even imagine."

“Tammie may have something like PTSD when she gets back, we’ll work through it. She has an entire support system waiting here."

Tammie’s 8-year-old son Chase and 12-year-old son Austin are here with their dad, Corey Konicki.

"Her two boys miss her," Jayne said. "They want their mommy back. They are worried about their grandma."

For now, Tammie continues to hit shelters and hospitals, handing out flyers looking for her mom.

"What is frustrating is that Sheila had a double knee replacement," Corey pointed out. "If they found her body, [they] would find 2 fake knees. That seems to be a slam dunk and so that's part of why Tammie is holding out hope because you would think tracing serial numbers would happen infinitely faster than the DNA test."

Iin the meantime, Tammie is taking care of her 14 remaining family members in California..

"They've got nothing," Jayne said. "I mean they lost all their clothes, their car, I mean everything."

Both Tammie and Corey are Army veterans who served in Afghanistan from 2004-05. It's an experience Tammie says still couldn’t have prepared her for this.

"This has been the most mentally challenging and...the most exhausted I’ve ever been,” she said.

Said Corey, "You just hold on to that glimmer of hope that it’s not her mom at the coroner’s office. So we just keep holding on to that glimmer of hope."

Jayne’s advice for anyone seeing this?

“Take your family and give them hugs. Let them know you love them, because you just never know."

If you'd like to help the Konicki family, click here or go on Facebook.

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