First Findings: A long-awaited Arizona State Forestry Division report released in September found no fault in the deaths of 19 firefighters who died in the Yarnell Hill fire in June.
The investigation, which examined why the Granite Mountain Hotshots team left the safety of an already burned area to attempt to reach an area nearly two miles away, found “no indication of negligence, reckless actions, or violations of policy or protocol.”
Communication with the team was lost about 30 minutes before they were overcome by flames, leaving many unanswered questions about why they chose to leave the burned area, known as the black.
The report stated: “Personnel who communicated with the Granite Mountain IHC knew the crew was in the black at that time and assumed they would stay there. No one realized the crew left the black and headed southeast, sometime after 16:04. At 16:30, thunderstorm outflows reached the southern perimeter of the fire. Winds increased substantially; the fire turned south and overran the Granite Mountain IHC at about 16:42.”
Second Look: A new report, prepared by independent consultants to the Arizona Division of Occupational Health and Safety, stands in sharp contrast to the earlier report. The new report, released on December 4, states that firefighters died because of “poor planning, bad communications, and ill-advised attempts to save structures and pastures that were “indefensible.”
The independent investigators found the Forestry Division was responsible for “multiple instances of firefighters being unnecessarily and unreasonably exposed to the deadly hazards of wildland firefighting.” The investigators also found that the Division failed to protect the firefighters from “recognized hazards that were causing or likely to cause death or serious physical harm.” They also stated that the team running the operations was understaffed and lacked the cohesion necessary to adequately plan for the contingencies of the fire and changing weather, according to the New York Times.
“The ball got dropped. That’s what our understanding is,” Marshall Krotenberg of the Division of Occupational Health and Safety told the Times.
Not all of the blame can be put on the agency, however. The report also points out the hotshots crew violated standard orders, such as not requesting a lookout and moving without notifying supervisors. Those decisions could have been due to equipment failure or fatigue—the crew had worked 28 of the previous 30 days, according to Popular Mechanics.
Last Word? The safety commission has recommended the Forestry Division pay fines totaling $559,000, including $25,000 to be paid to the estate of each of the fallen firefighters, according to the Times. The State Forestry Division declined comment on the findings and on the proposed fines, stating that they needed time to review the report.