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Terrible.... just awful. Prayers for these brave souls and their families.

One line in the article really caught my attention:

"The average age of the hot-shot crew was 22 years old."

I porfess absolutely no knowledge of firefighting, even more so this highly specialized type of activity, but isn't experience, the wisdom of years very important in this type of work. There is also something called "youthful exuberance and the adrenaline rush." The young feel they are immortal, invincible.

We've all heard the old adage.."There are bold pilots, and old pilots, but there are no bold, old pilots."

I remember long ago as a newly minted, still wet behind he ears, Marine 2nd LT, being told to listen to the experienced NCOs..

I do hope that the after-action report will examine this, as well as other possible contributory factors..

This same crew fought over 14 fires in the past 12 months, as far away as Minnesota, so they would seem to be rather experienced. Check the video at the link. Their crew supervisors are well over 30 or 40.

From the Stand With Arizona site comments...

Several were found dead inside their shelters. One escaped unharmed. One has burns over 75% of their body and is on the way to the hospital.

Folks, these Hot Shot teams are the most highly trained fire fighters in the world. These folks have 10 to 20 years experience fighting these fires. These are not the sort of crews that are easily trapped by a fire, they know what they are doing.

This fire must have done something completely unexpected and caught them in a situation where they had no time to escape. There was a thunderstorm that moved through Yarnell with winds up to 50 MPH ahead of it this afternoon at about the time contact with these firefighters were lost. There is also some notion that there was a nearby "dry lightning" strike that started a smoldering fire that suddenly exploded when those winds came up.

Americans have a tradition of answering the call when danger threatens their communities. Sometimes danger wins. Godspeed to the Granite Mountain Hot Shot Crew. Heroes one and all. Your families, friends, and neighbors are in our thoughts and our prayers tonight.

Prayers up for Gods hand of comfort to these brave souls, as well as their sole surviving brother hotshot and all their families and friends that will be so greatly affected by their loss.

My understanding from our local tv news reports tonight 22 years old may be the average age... but the team was a well rounded team made up of older experienced guys all the way down to new recruits... these guys were very busy lately, just came off the lines from 2 previous consective fires.

From what they were saying tonight, purely something caused by weather, and an overabundence of fuel... 10 years of drought and no fires in this area for 40 years now... they were on their own with no radio contact, had no idea it was headed their way until too late to get out of the way.

There is a youtube video that shows timelapse of the fire/smoke growing and the thunderstorm building right over the top of it... then the thunderhead collapsed cold air down on the fire and reversed it’s direction 180 degrees

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QT1Z5l0hHYk

My husband is a hotshot and has been the last 16 years. I to fight fire and know the dangers of being a hotshot. Hotshot crews Rarely hire people that do not have at least two seasons fight fire and even that is a stretch due to the nature of the job. As for overhead there are 9 positions with each overhead personnel having at least 5 seasons as a hotshot. These men and women are the best of the best in the wildland fire community. You rarely see them on TV because they are on the front lines of the fireline in the hottest and hardest parts of the fire. To say these kids were probably “wet behind the ears” is not right. My husband had the pleasure with working with this crew last year and he said they were a great crew.

“The average age of the hot-shot crew was 22 years old.”

I profess absolutely no knowledge of firefighting, even more so this highly specialized type of activity, but isn’t experience, the wisdom of years very important in this type of work.

Consider that this kind of firefighting operation is much like combat.

Hubby is a retired firefighter. He was our county’s top watershed expert and ran our hot shot crew for many years. Being on a hot shot crew IS a young mans job. Most everything they do is done by hand. They walk across mountains to the front lines of a fire and use picks and shovels to dig lines of defense against fire and set back fires.
Again, it is a young mans job.

What is wrong with you that you thought it was a good idea to criticize these people. Have you no soul? No heart? Hot Shots are HIGHLY trained units, the special forces of the fire fighting department. In high desert areas like Yarnell/Prescott, Hot Shots literally are our saviors. They put their lives on the line every single day and bravely stand between us and destruction. On behalf of all the Hot Shots, their family, friends and the whole area, I would like to say: SHAME ON YOU. I am offended and disgusted by your comment and I truly hope you THOROUGHLY rethink your statement or consider deleting it all together. Ignorant and insensitive.

The young feel they are immortal, invincible.

Ken, at age 22, I had been an Industrial Firefighter for 3 years. The last thing I ever felt on-scene was invincible. Whole lots of praying going on during the really bad ones. Some of scariest times of my life, that's for sure.