19: The True Story of the Yarnell Hill Fire

I knew they could see what was going on Eric and Steed all the guys you know they make the smartest decisions they can but when we pulled out and went to the cafe it started to become more real what was going on so I could actually take it step back and look at the fire and kind of see where they were at um but looking back yeah it escalated quickly into a horrible situation I was shocked I couldn't believe it I was like no it'll be fine it'll be tough but then it just comes to a point where you have to be real with yourself of what options there are you know either they're gonna live or they're gonna die that's just something you have to think about all this is going on and I'm sitting in the buggy our buggies and you know I could just phone's going off family members trying to get a hold of them I don't know what to do I didn't want to answer them I wish I could I wish they could have answered them but I just it wasn't gonna happen I think I was laying in the hammock reading a book and my phone just started exploding with text message after text message of people just saying I'm so sorry I heard what happened we're praying for you uh and I didn't know what that meant I mean yeah it made sense that they had to deploy and that it was a dangerous situation whenever you have to deploy a shelter it's not a good position to be in you don't you don't look to that that's not what you want to do and come home but he said you know uh the Granite Mountain guys deployed today I was like what I know what that means that I was thinking that it was okay okay still so I was like okay what do I need to do what do I need to do we're already working on the fire with a Yarnell Hill I see so he's the guy who's in charge of the fire so we're on this incident now we're here at Granite Mountain I see Granite Mountain Incident Commander that means there's somebody now has taken charge of an event and that event probably has something to do with Granite Mountain I just got a phone call saying there's been a deployment so now you're listening for all those little Telltale science that is this a deployment is this not a deployment because I've been on enough fires over the years that sometimes guys deploy in anticipation that things are going to go bad a friend of mine who's a police officer for Prescott he was standing there and his dad was Clayton's Chief and he said Christy I just got off the phone with my dad and it's been confirmed and I just collapsed in the middle of the street and then somebody walked past me and told me all 19 all 19 and I'm like what and finally I grabbed somebody I know I now know it was Dan Bates and I just said is my husband okay he said what's your name and I told him my name and he's he said no so I started talking to anybody who I thought had the authority to make that decision that Mark and I whenever they decided if it was that night if it was the next day if it was two days from now that Mark and I would be a part of that team that would come and get our boys and so there were 12 of us 11 us 11 us were from Prescott fire and we had one Chino firefighter whose son had been on the crew he was with us as well so we we made the decision that we'd have three teams of four that we would work such that four individuals would pick up a body and then the two other groups of four would line the sides of the rear of each truck and salute them as the bodies were loaded you could tell that the guys were all very tight together like they probably were touching each other on all you know all around each other I just took some rocks and I um took some of the foil that was from their shelter blankets and some of the dirt um but at the time I wasn't upset when I was doing it because I felt like I was so connected to them that they were actually there while I was there around me so I can't really explain it 100 but it was really actually comforting those guys were our family it was important to us important to them that we'd be the ones to go in and get them so I wouldn't hesitate I wouldn't go back and change it even though it was the most tragic painful thing I've ever done in my life would you never sorry it ever happened I'm sorry I had to endure it I'm sorry that all these families have to endure it but sad as it is glad in its own way that I I was able to do that for them laughs

Channel: Outside

Views: 259,573

Keywords: Yarnell Hill Fire, Outside (Magazine), wildfire, HotShots, Granite Mountain

Id: SDI4HfkBje8

Length: 7min 14sec (434 seconds)

Published: Wed May 28 2014