I am reminded of the first time I encountered this situation. In fact, I have a photo I took of one being born on my desk. I had not seen one before but I didn't like it and hurried my squad to a safety zone. I also informed the Super, Chuck Hartley and the Pusher, Paul Gleason. Chuck pulled us out of the area entirely. All we could was watch that Devil burn across two ridges. I learned a lot and had the best mentors a 20 year old hot shot could hope to have. Canyon Fire 1968.
That person you remember could have been Paul. Paul began his wildfire career in 1964 as a crewman on the ANF Dalton Hotshots. When I joined the crew in 1966, he was a third year crewman. Our last fire of the year, the Loop Fire, began on November 1, 1966. That fire killed 12 El Cariso Hotshots who were working the same sector of line. Paul became Superintendent of the Zig Zag Hotshots on the Mt. Hood NF.
Eventually he became FMO for the Rocky Mountain Region of the NPS and taught wildfire at Colorado State University. He was also a regional fire management and fire safety trainer. He died fairly young of cancer. You may want to google him to find out more about him.
During this time, he and his crew were on the Dude Fire near Payson, AZ. A blow up on that fire killed several members of an inmate crew. Paul not only witness this but ran into the fire to pull out some of the crewmen. After this fire, Paul developed LCES.
This entire fire was a debacle. I was on the IA with Helitack 527. We went downhill parallel with no safety zone and active torching below on a near 100% grade. Totally ridiculous. If not for the first engine on scene holding them up, the first shot crew would have went down hill on it right away. Instead, we were hed up till nightfall when it was safer. I was right down the street prepping the old dirt road to caramel/greenfield for a burn in front of the fire's head when this happened...
Why does the name paul gleason sound so familiar to me? I had some training in chimayo, nm years back. I want to think he was there. I may be wrong. I remember a guy talking to us about the man gulch fire (tall caucasion, older man). please let me know. For years I have been trying to figure out who that guy was that talked to us out there in nm. He had so much passion when it came to fire and firefighter safety. He so much emphasized safety as YOU. :)
...one of our genius crew members even blasted himself with the heli-torch on this one... tell you what, we get nothing but lucky on these big fires. there's just so many stupid things and protocol violations happening at once. How many top HotShot Crew leaders saw this activity and din't report it??? What happened to LCES? I'm VERY surprised this doesn't happen more... And yeah, if you saw the debris field from this they're lucky the massive oak tree branches didn't kill them...
wow good job fulton would not have done things any different, stop putting fire on the ground when you can see the rotating plume, instead keep going ,send the engine back to clean up your mess. typical arogance pride egotism got those boys burned. you have no regret, would not have done anything different. yep.
I am reminded of the first time I encountered this situation. In fact, I have a photo I took of one being born on my desk. I had not seen one before but I didn't like it and hurried my squad to a safety zone. I also informed the Super, Chuck Hartley and the Pusher, Paul Gleason. Chuck pulled us out of the area entirely. All we could was watch that Devil burn across two ridges. I learned a lot and had the best mentors a 20 year old hot shot could hope to have. Canyon Fire 1968.
That person you remember could have been Paul. Paul began his wildfire career in 1964 as a crewman on the ANF Dalton Hotshots. When I joined the crew in 1966, he was a third year crewman. Our last fire of the year, the Loop Fire, began on November 1, 1966. That fire killed 12 El Cariso Hotshots who were working the same sector of line. Paul became Superintendent of the Zig Zag Hotshots on the Mt. Hood NF.
Eventually he became FMO for the Rocky Mountain Region of the NPS and taught wildfire at Colorado State University. He was also a regional fire management and fire safety trainer. He died fairly young of cancer. You may want to google him to find out more about him.
During this time, he and his crew were on the Dude Fire near Payson, AZ. A blow up on that fire killed several members of an inmate crew. Paul not only witness this but ran into the fire to pull out some of the crewmen. After this fire, Paul developed LCES.
This entire fire was a debacle. I was on the IA with Helitack 527. We went downhill parallel with no safety zone and active torching below on a near 100% grade. Totally ridiculous. If not for the first engine on scene holding them up, the first shot crew would have went down hill on it right away. Instead, we were hed up till nightfall when it was safer. I was right down the street prepping the old dirt road to caramel/greenfield for a burn in front of the fire's head when this happened...
Los Padres NF Engine 71 is the image for this video. Is that old model 62 B fire engine 4WD?
Why does the name paul gleason sound so familiar to me? I had some training in chimayo, nm years back. I want to think he was there. I may be wrong. I remember a guy talking to us about the man gulch fire (tall caucasion, older man). please let me know. For years I have been trying to figure out who that guy was that talked to us out there in nm. He had so much passion when it came to fire and firefighter safety. He so much emphasized safety as YOU. :)
...one of our genius crew members even blasted himself with the heli-torch on this one... tell you what, we get nothing but lucky on these big fires. there's just so many stupid things and protocol violations happening at once. How many top HotShot Crew leaders saw this activity and din't report it??? What happened to LCES? I'm VERY surprised this doesn't happen more... And yeah, if you saw the debris field from this they're lucky the massive oak tree branches didn't kill them...
the way, this is narrated..., is annoying.
It's because it's meant as a training video, viewed in a classroom. I assume the pauses are to emphasize key terminology.
wow good job fulton would not have done things any different, stop putting fire on the ground when you can see the rotating plume, instead keep going ,send the engine back to clean up your mess. typical arogance pride egotism got those boys burned. you have no regret, would not have done anything different. yep.