Report: Federal firefighters nearly got killed in botched operation

Scott Sonner

Thursday, Dec. 9, 1999 | 4:11 a.m.

AP newsman Tom Gardner in Reno, Nev., also contributed to this report.

CARLIN, Nev. - An inexperienced government fire crew and its supervisors broke practically every rule in the book and were nearly burned alive during a Nevada range fire last summer before a shift in the wind saved them.

Because of the previously undisclosed incident, the Bureau of Land Management's firefighting operation was slapped with a citation from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration for the first time since 14 federal firefighters were killed in a Colorado wildfire in 1994.

The BLM was cited this time for failing to protect the six workers from "recognized hazards that were causing or likely to cause death or serious injury," according to an internal BLM memo obtained by The Associated Press. The BLM must respond to the citation and take corrective action.

Also because of the incident, one of 18 elite national firefighting teams was disbanded because it was in charge of the Nevada fire - the first time such action has been taken. And the National Park Service has set new standards limiting the number of inexperienced people on a dangerous fire line at one time.

The narrow escape took place on a fiery ridge of sagebrush on Aug. 9. Six firefighters were treated for smoke inhalation and three of them were hospitalized, two with severe burns.

The situation was so desperate that three firefighters began to deploy their aluminum-foil-like personal fire shelters, known as "shake and bakes" - the last line of defense when flames are about to overtake a firefighter.

"A fortuitous wind shift allowed the (crew) to escape the fire," an investigative team for the BLM concluded.

The state BLM director defended the agency Wednesday, noting that there were no deaths or life-threatening injuries during the record fire season this year.

"We take safety seriously. It is our highest priority," Bob Abbey said. At one point in early August, more than 4,000 people were fighting wildfires in Nevada. "Given the number of people and types of fires we had," Abbey said, "I think we did very well."

The investigative report paints a picture of a perfect recipe for disaster - from the broken-down bus that brought the inexperienced National Park Service workers from California to Elko, Nev., to jammed radio frequencies, poor planning and pressure from ranchers to stop the flames.

Among other things, supervisors ignored dangerous fire and weather conditions, failed to adequately brief the fire crews, failed to post lookouts, established safety zones too far apart and failed to establish a clear chain of command, the report said.

Firefighting resources in the region were strained to the limit because the 170,000-acre fire was just one of several fires burning.

The BLM and the U.S. Forest Service were also hit with a citation after the 1994 tragedy in Colorado during the so-called Storm King fire.

In that fire, firefighters dropped on the top of a mountain were trapped by flames. Among other things, poor communication, inexperience on the fire lines and misguided management were blamed for those deaths.

One investigator said the close call in Nevada shows that the lessons from the Storm King fire may have already been forgotten.

"We had a lot of investigations and a lot of reviews and a lot of time was spent talking about what we are going to do, but a lot of those things are just not being done," said John Kraushaar, a regional officer for the National Park Service.

"We need to take that Sadler fire investigation report and give it to all our entry-level firefighters and tell them, 'Here, this is what can happen," Kraushaar said.

A man whose son was killed in the Colorado fire says safety lessons learned from that fire have never been properly implemented in the field.

"As far as close calls, it happens all the time. It's still happening," Bob Mackey said Thursday from Hamilton, Mont.

"It is a miracle they don't kill a lot more people and have a lot more people hurt."