BackDrafted

Ya gotta love and respect firefighters. The training that goes into being able to do the job is close to excruciating, and the danger element is frequently high.

A Facebook friend recently commented that fighting a fire was not the same as sitting in a classroom, learning how to.

I'll second that, with one proviso: I never had the luxury of the classroom. My experience was OJT.

In September of 1978, a group of minimally-to-not-at-all trained firefighters turned to and took on the Deer Creek Canyon/Murphy Gulch fire that broke out on the morning/afternoon of September 10.

The near picture at the top was not staged; nor was it the first or last time that fire fighters found themselves in rapid retreat before a fire that week.

I remember most of it well; I was one amongst those who fit the category "not-at-all trained" for what I would experience over the next several days.

Memories of that experience simply give me that much more respect for the Four Mile Canyon firefighters.

An employee of Johns-Manville at the time -- part of the Security Department for the HQ building in Deer Creek Canyon -- we were summoned from the company picnic that day, to respond ASAP to work. A fire had broken out in the Murphy Gulch area, west-southwest of the HQ facility, and was threatening to go in our direction.

As we assembled at work, none of us were trained for, nor really knew what we were about to engage in; and initially, our engagement was limited to perimeter security (aka, keep lookenspeepers away from the danger areas). That was how I spent my first 8 hours: at a gated access road on the Ken Caryl Ranch, keeping unauthorized vehicles out of the area (an area void of much of anything in '78; now, that valley is chocked full of homes).

During my 8 hours, my only visitors were a Jeffco deputy and my supervisor. The fire wasn't visible from my vantage point, and would never get close to where I was at the time. I was finding the duty about as exciting as a popcorn fart.

That would change.

As the fire grew in size and spread out, more resources were called upon. Soon, we found ourselves shuttling firefighters closer to the fire; delivering supplies; and in some cases, assisting in fighting the fire.

In one of the photos above, two of us were photographed descending into an area where the fire still smoldered; our pithy efforts therein were referred to as "extinguish smoldering hot spots to prevent flare-ups". We were clueless as to how to extinguish hotspots, especially sans water. Lots of shovelling made us look like we knew what we were doing.

And it made the photographer happy. So did a slurry drop, less than a quarter mile from where we stood at the time.

Later, I was part of a team that had run a hose up the hillside, SW of the building, to keep the ever-shifting fire away from the parking lot and burning up close to the building itself. I learned several valuable lessons that morning:

- a 3" fire hose is heavier than it looks.

- it takes a number of folks to manhandle such a hose up a slope.

- when the folks at the head of the hose drop it and run, it's a good idea to follow their lead.

- a hundred feet or so of 3" hose is undoubtedly expensive; but not so much so that when the winds shifted, a firefighter at the front of the hose delivered a poignant, pungent piece of advice in passing: "drop the f***ing thing and RUN!"

- I could, at least in those days, run faster downhill, than a wind-driven fire could.

The fire won that round: it burned to the edge of the parking lot. Then the wind shifted, and it was off and running in another direction again.

Later that night, I received what today is the funniest of directives from my supervisor at that time: lead a group of firefighters off the north end of the building to the edges of the fire. I was ever so eager to do so; at the same time, I had never personally been on the terrain to the north of the building. When I asked him how it was that I was "leading" them, he chuckled and said "you're their escort; stay with 'em and keep your eyes open".

It was a case of the blindly-inexperienced leading the experienced into a flaming amphitheatre.

The firefighters had the typical array of rough terrain equipment: primarily shovels and 'Indian tanks'; I had my duty belt with .357, spare ammo, and handcuffs. I reckon I was ill-equipped for this mission, unless arresting the fire and taking it in for disorderly combustion was an option.

Thus, with me in the lead, we were off. Ahead, we could see a line of fire, and so we headed straightaway for it. But we couldn't see "the rest of the story" until we got within spitting distance of the edge of the fire: we didn't get a couple hundred yards north before we found ourselves with fire on three sides of us; no one seemed terribly concerned about it, so I didn't give into the sphincter spasm that accompanied my seeing we were in something of a coffin corner. The firefighters were pretty nonchalant about it; one quipped "what would your mother say if she could see you now?".

Not one for expletives generally, I still think a heartfelt "WTF?" would probably have been at the top of her list.

After some moments of assessing that the way forward was only meant for heavy equipment and/or hotdogs, I reckoned withdrawal was in order. I didn't get so much as a "aw, c'mawn, this is fun" in reply, since we all sensed a shift in the wind again, and it wasn't one in our favor. So, we backed away from what would burn later that night. Wisdom oft times trumps dubious leadership.

After the fire burned the equivalent of a horseshoe around the west side of the building, it moved again north and a bit east, leaving me one more opportunity to experience "extinguishing hotspots to prevent flare-ups". On this occasion, I donned an 'Indian tank' -- a metal backpack capable of holding 5 gallons of water, with a pump hose dispenser -- and started again up on the northside of the building, this time in daylight.

The terrain on the north side was mostly uphill, and I found that the 'Indian tank' was cumbersome, the water loved to slosh, and each uphill step was accompanied by a "what the f*** was I thinking?". And five gallons of water didn't last all that long: I made three refill trips, each time repeating the refrain "what the f*** was I thinking?".

It was good to be 21 at that time and place.

Gradually, the 3,300 acre fire was contained and extinguished over the course of several days. As I recall, a few outbuildings were lost (mostly in the Murphy Gulch area, where the fire started), but no homes, and my employer's HQ facility was not damaged.

The professionals did a good job. The rest of us were just lucky.

I would get one more experience in wild fire fighting, near the same location in 1980. There, I was among the first to arrive on scene of a much smaller fire, but one that threatened to get away in a hurry if help didn't arrive. On that occasion, I learned that an effort to save a single tree, in the face of a wind-driven fire, was not worth the singe I got when the tree went WHOOF in my face (aka, my quickly-hacked 'fire line' wasn't up to 20 mph wind gusts). Fortunately, that fire was contained to a few, mostly prairie-grass acres, thanks to a prompt response from the Bancroft Fire Department. All I got that time was some good-natured ribbing about the tree I tried to save.

Nowadays, the spotted owls are on their own.

Today, I leave the firefighting to those trained and in shape to do it. The only fires I fight are in my kitchen. I reckon I've become a master at those. Both starting and stopping. Well...so far on the latter.