Carrie's Great Adventures: The Rattlesnake Staff Ride

I'm up at my Advanced Firefighter Academy in Sacramento, CA. Yesterday we had what is called a Staff Ride. Staff Rides are trips to wildland firefighter fatality sites where we learn about what happened, what went wrong, and get to see it for ourselves. This was the Rattlesnake Fire on the Mendocino National Forest. On July 9th, 1953, 15 firefighters died on this fire. Here's a link to more information about the Rattlesnake Staff Ride: http://www.fireleadership.gov/toolbox/staffride/library_staff_ride2.html

Here's a link to Staff Rides in general:

http://www.fireleadership.gov/toolbox/staffride/index.html

So we got up at some crazy hour of the morning, before the sun even came out. We all piled into 4 or 5 soccer mom vans and headed out to the Mendocino.

They have stops along the area of the fire where we have group discussions led by moderators who have studied the fire extensively. We talk about what we would do in the situation, see where the fire started, learn about tactics used, etc.

This is a memorial to those that died. 15 men in all from a missionary crew and the Forest Service.

It's pretty hard to see in this picture, but there are 14 small crosses and one large cross up on this hill. The large cross marks Missionary Rock and is dedicated to all the men that died there. The 14 crosses were placed where each of the bodies were found. Some were identified, others were not. There are no names on the crosses. Every year, this area is maintained by the Forest Service.

Also hard to see in this picture to the left, is the last cross (so 15 small crosses total). This man made it surprisingly far. Due to a sudden wind shift, just as the guys were sitting down to eat lunches that were brought to them (after 10pm) the fire activity picked up and they had to run for their lives. The brush was incredibly thick and tall. This picture was taken from Missionary Rock, looking down at the last cross. It's quite a ways. You can see the cross the the end of the little trail (which was not there when the fire occured) right in front of the large bush in the middle of the canyon.

One of the first to fall:

The group that stuck together.

This is the cross of the last man to die. Like I said, he made it extremely far. The fire died down just shortly after it overcame him. He almost made it.