Wildland
I held a red card for several years and worked a couple of campaign fires https://www.dankolaw.com/blog/what-is-a-campaign-fire/
I guess combat exceeds it – (usually) no one’s shooting at you … but …
When you’ve spent 3 nights sleeping on a hose bed, you’re working a line – your buddies up and down the line nearby, the flames suddenly burst up around you, you find you’re surrounded by flames – a burnover … you’re hoping a tanker plane drops the retardant next to you, not on you.
You’re hoping the plane shows up.
On Saturday, June 27, while working on a wildfire in western Colorado, five federal firefighters were involved in a burnover incident resulting in shelter deployment. Two firefighters are being treated for burn injuries, and three others did not survive. The identities of the U.S. Wildland Fire Service and U.S. Forest Service firefighters are being withheld pending notifications.
You don’t deploy shelters unless a dire emergency – dire as in the “you’re dead but don’t know it yet” stage, but that baked potato sack might help you survive anyway. Or at least help us find your bodies afterwards.
I still have my potato sack laying around here someplace, packed up and never used. It’s old and of no use anymore except for memories.
The fire, originally started June 26, was caused by lightning near the Colorado-Utah border. Saturday saw extreme fire behavior, which is expected to continue on Sunday, according to the the Upper Colorado River Interagency Fire Management Unit. Firefighters are evaluating conditions and determining the “safest and most effective suppression tactics.”
Damn! RIP brothers – Hell of a way to go …
As in combat as well as it appears that level of conflagration – there is a “to whom it may concern” component. In either example in my opinion of experience of the first, Mother Nature always bats last.
Prayers and fair winds.
You had that job at one time? Damn.
This story is heartbreaking.
So sad, DT. Can’t believe you were in that situation at one time and
glad that time is over.
Nearly got caught fighting a prairie fire once as a volunteer fireman. It’s nothing to fiddle around with, for sure, when the winds are high and change direction.
In combat you are fighting your enemy. Never had firefights more than a couple of hours. Here, you know and see what you are going into and you fight the flames from hell with no idea when it will end. I am extremely awed.