Yarnell fire report leaves key question unanswered
Source: azcentral.com
The Granite Mountain Hotshots were overcome by flames June 30 in a chaparral canyon about 35 miles south of Prescott when the Yarnell Hill fire, pushed by monsoon-storm winds, blew up and changed directions. The death toll was the highest from a U.S. wildfire in at least a half-century.
The report released Saturday by the Yarnell Hill Fire Serious Accident Investigation Team leaves a central question unanswered: Why did the 19 Granite Mountain Hotshots leave a previously burned area atop a ridge and descend into a bowl where they later were overtaken by fire?
“Personnel who communicated with the Granite Mountain IHC knew the crew was in the black at that time and assumed they would stay there,” the report says. “No one realized that the crew left the black and headed southeast, sometime after 1604 (4:04 p.m.). At 1630, thunderstorm outflows reached the southern perimeter of the fire. Winds increased substantially; the fire turned south and overran the Granite Mountain IHC at about 1642.”
Read the full report here. http://www.azcentral.com/ic/pdf/yarnell-hill-fire-report.pdf
Complete coverage of the Yarnell Hill fire, including photos, videos, maps and biographies of the fallen men is available here http://www.azcentral.com/news/wildfires/yarnell/%22
Read more: http://www.azcentral.com/news/arizona/free/20130920yarnell-fire-investigation-report-findings.html
There are no words....