Volkswagen debuts restored vintage blue bus that survived a California wildfire and melted hearts

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LOS ANGELES (AP) — A vintage blue VW bus that became an unlikely symbol of resilience after it survived a California wildfire made its public debut this week, shiny and like-new after Volkswagen spent months restoring the damaged vehicle.

The bus went viral in January when an Associated Press photographer captured it looking surprisingly unharmed by the deadly Palisades Fire, a spot of blue and white dwarfed by the charred remains of a Malibu neighborhood. Volkswagen saw the accompanying AP story and reached out to the owner, Megan Weinraub. Upon closer inspection, VW technicians discovered that while the bus had survived, it had smoke damage and blistered paint, rust and a window busted by the heat.

In its restoration, the 1977 Type 2 Microbus named Azul — Spanish for the color blue — again brought people together as technicians consulted the broader community of VW enthusiasts in a shared mission to revive what was a quirky middle-aged vehicle.

“It melted and Volkswagen saved it,” Weinraub said Thursday at the LA Auto Show, standing with the bus's previous owner, Preston Martin. “It was a giant relief because it wasn’t my first priority with everything going on.”

They still can’t believe the bus they wrote off as a goner is now ready to take them on another surfing adventure. The last time they saw a pre-burned Azul was two days before the Palisades Fire broke out, when they parked the bus near Weinraub's apartment after surfing.

Mark J. Terrill, the AP photographer who captured the original image, was on hand when Weinraub and Martin saw the bus for the first time after its restoration in late October.

Volkswagen hauled the microbus to its Oxnard facility west of Los Angeles where it houses historic VW vehicles. Vehicle technicians Farlan Robertson and Gunnar Wynarski sourced hard-to-find parts, got creative and reached out to a lot of people.

“At the bottom of it it was to try to take the vehicle that everyone else saw and do what we could to improve upon it, but not change it," said Robertson, “to actually have it come out and be the revived, resurrected vehicle returned to its former glory.”

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Har reported from San Francisco