Tim Hart, a smokejumper, died June 2, 2021 after being critically injured during a hard landing while parachuting into the Eicks Fire in New Mexico. One of his friends and co-workers has written a tribute to Tim.

By Patrick McGunagle

One intuits the magnitude of Tim Hart’s line of duty death immediately: Smokejumper passes away after fire jump in New Mexico. It’s something that shouldn’t have been, a system error; there must be some mistake. This isn’t how one of us should go, somehow not the same as the tragedies we wildland fire folk take so much care to avoid: crushed by snags, rolling rocks, burnover. There’s a randomness here that we don’t yet understand. As Pam Hart stated so eloquently in her eulogy for her son:

“For Tim, on May 24th, 2021, it was a normal day. Their base was called for a fire, and Tim and his smokejumping comrades went out to do the job they did so well. This jump was to be totally different. My son died but not in vain and not for nothing, He died doing a job he truly loved to do. As his mom, I am sad that I will not see or hear my son again. But I am so very proud of the man who was doing a job he loved. Tim David Hart, you will always be with me, in my heart and in my thoughts, as well as in the hearts and thoughts of family and friends and very brave and loved wildland firefighters and jumpers. You will never be gone because you live in all of us who loved and know you. Thank you for your service, Tim, you are a true hero.“

Life friend Matt Werner said: “It is true… he was a firefighter, a smokejumper, madly in love with Michelle and the South Fork (in that order)…. Perpetually in motion, doing what he loved.”

Finally, Michelle, Tim’s incredible wife, challenged the stadium: “Enjoy silence, embrace mystery. Be the first to action, live at the tip of the spear. Do not let anyone alter or quiet your voice. This is how Tim lived.”

Tim has been celebrated, cheered, and sent off by his fellow smokejumpers over two weeks all of us will never forget, yet would trade for anything if we could only have him back. Fire season is here and many of us are back on the line, cracking chutes over God’s country (well, some God-forsaken places, too). For many smokejumpers of the younger cohort, Tim’s passing was the first major death they’ve experienced, and that it happened by jumping took away a lot of the sanctimonious veil of this high-speed lifestyle. I’m worried for many of them this upcoming offseason when the adrenaline and excitement of jumps and fires can’t dilute the necessary grief and processing we will all need.

I didn’t have the privilege of being Tim’s best friend or even his rookie bro (RB); the testimonials to his life given by these people are recorded on Tim’s celebration ceremony, along with his processional, at the Custer Gallatin NF Facebook page. These speeches are evidence of sacred and brotherly bond and I do not contend to hold better words to honor Tim.

However, Tim was a fellow smokejumper and a friend of mine. For some reason, the way the List worked out, I ended up jumping more fires with him than any other jumper out of West Yellowstone during my two years there. I was on the load with him when he finally got his dream home forest jump in fall 2019 on the Shoshone outside of Cody. Last summer I had a fantastic jump in the Wind Rivers with him. Many good chats with that guy around the campfire and sipping his homemade whiskey. For some reason, when a love of mine passed away last fall (she was also in fire), it was just Tim and a very sad version of myself at the base in West for a few weeks, so we had lots of barbecues and pondered this thing called life.

I won’t give all my memories of Tim away. But another tragedy is that what I get to hold isn’t much beyond Tim’s “you go on now and get yourself right, always here for an ear if you need it.” Maybe if I’d called him once in the offseason, to talk about our elk hunts, new rye whiskeys, and interstellar phenomena. Too many maybes already, too soon.

I had jumped a fire in Nevada a week before Tim met Fate and as the situation developed, I knew there was one place on Earth I needed to be. It was all of a sudden very real when Tim arrived in Cody, WY, on the Sherpa, to be received by his jumpers and community. The procession event was very well done: there were engines and fire folk standing for Tim at every point of the day, even in Grand Junction, CO, when the Sherpa refueled. In Cody, West Yellowstone Smokejumpers were able to carry Tim from the Honor Guard aboard the Sherpa and bring him to the waiting hearse, a very moving experience for us all (the Honor Guard very rarely releases control of the person to any other personnel). Hundreds of ordinary folk lined the roads to the funeral home, paying respects to a man they barely knew.

Watching over Tim’s casket for the week before the funeral is the highest honor of my fire career. True to the character of the smokejumper program, Tim was never out of smokejumper sight or presence since his jump; he always had a jump partner. For line of duty deaths, the USFS provides a joint BLM/NPS/USFS Honor Guard to respect the fallen, nonstop, until internment. This fantastic group volunteers time from their normal jobs to honor fallen peers they’ve never met. These folks were blown away by the smokejumper resilience and dedication to staying with Tim, 24/7, for the week in El Paso and then the week in Cody. However, as fresh Honor Guard rotated through, I don’t think they were quite sure what to make of us jumpers: we never left, the mood alternated from somber to general smokejumper carousing with some increasingly finer rye whiskeys (his favorites), beers, strong coffee, and increasingly exaggerated smokejumper tales. We got too caffeinated in the morning to sit still in grief. Instead of soft, somber background music, we had folk music and bluegrass playing too loudly for a funeral home, as Tim would have liked. Tim loved playing his banjo and had many stories to add to the night as well.

Standing watch for Tim in the deepest hours of the night captivated us all in different ways. Long hours thinking about what it all means, our place in the world, against/with nature, among friends, and to our loves.

Tim’s wife, Michelle, is an unbelievably strong individual. She spent many hours with us and Tim (we gave her the room when she requested) and outperformed us all in practically navigating the logistics of the next several days. I personally learned a lot about life, love, and fine whiskeys from Tim, via Michelle, that week.

I’ll never forget standing honor watch for Tim with other West and GAC bros for that week and the suddenness and immediacy in which, on Thursday before the ceremony, he was taken away for cremation and we were all just standing bleary-eyed in an empty room. Then the hangover feeling, or perhaps cold water rush of knowing that it’s almost about to be over, the bookend on Tim’s life placed, and that Tim’s last call would happen and he’d be Off the List. This sudden realization and the knowledge that eighty bros were about to show up, the Chief of the USFS, the governor of WY, all that pomp and circumstance – things became much faster very quickly.

Michelle recognized this and hosted the WYS smokejumpers, the jumpers from Silver City, and Tim’s rookie bros out at her place for a BBQ. This was such a great idea on her part as this was truly a celebration of Tim as he’d like it: no speeches, just cooking and community and shared laughs. Westies spent the day clearing/cleaning/fixing the few things on their property that Tim hadn’t gotten to. Everything from fencing to gutters to trees to the garden were fixed up, pruned, adjusted, refinished, etc. Michelle brought out a mason jar of Tim’s homemade whiskey and we all lit a large bonfire in their field as the sun set in front of Cedar Mountain of the Shoshone. Gosh, I wish I could write out just how Tim pronounced “the Shoshone,” simultaneously incorporating a nostalgic fondness to his standard slightly gravelly, somewhere between Midwest and Southern accent.

The ceremony was what we needed it to be. So many folks put in so much effort to what was really a great sendoff. Many of us Westies wore pearl snap button-ups, Tim’s signature look, and old sneakers or boots with dirty greens, also Tim’s style. This wasn’t going to be a formal showpiece for anybody “high up,” but rather our ceremony for our brother.

Tim’s mother Pam gave an absolutely heart-wrenching speech. I’m not sure how it came out over the livestream video, but there in person, it was unbelievable the pride and power of her voice as she spoke tribute for her son. There wasn’t a dry eye in the stadium as she spoke. I think many of us were picturing our own mothers up on that stage had the List and other aspects of fate put us in that position on the load rather than Tim. Pam had lost her husband, Tim’s father, when Tim was 18, an event that shaped both their lives. What that woman has had to go through- talk about a wise soul. Tim’s good buddy Ben and some of his RB’s also spoke great stories of his travels through his fire career and finally meeting Michelle and moving to West. Michelle’s speech confirmed to us all that love truly transcends death.

Tim’s last call, a recorded transmission from Bozeman dispatch- man, that one particularly got me. Having worked from engine crew on up, hearing the dispatch I used to call out to reporting “Hart, West Yellowstone Smokejumper, Bozeman dispatch… no contact, dispatch clear” struck me especially hard. Then the final fire call- West’s signature “William Tell Overture” played three times: a conditioned adrenaline shock to my system (suit up! Fire call!), coupled with loss, now that our brother Tim is Off the List.

Like many smokejumper events, when the formality of the fancy ceremony was over, the real “carrying on” could finally occur. The bros organized a city park rental just outside of Cody (the city had never done this before and went above and beyond out of their way to accommodate us). RAC welfare fund had a timely donation to rent porta-johns, a food truck, and near midnight an emergency order of 25 pizzas. We tried to buy a handful of kegs from the local store, but found out our money was no good there: take the beer and bring the kegs back empty, please. I don’t think jumpers paid much all week downtown at the Silver Dollar Bar- nearly every time we went up to pay for the round “someone already covered you guys – they walked out a few minutes ago.”

Some West jumpers organized a Big Flip. With 127 participants, the Silver City half dollar ice cream flip coin (which was presented to Michelle), and taking over three hours, we threw in several thousand dollars which was won by a pilot and, of course, immediately donated to Michelle.

I talked with many people last week about the National Smokejumper Association. Michelle and her family were so honored by the NSA’s large donation to the Gofundme, a tribute to Tim by people she’s never met. Understanding that the legacy of Tim both as a person and as a smokejumper are now a critical part of the smokejumper story, well, I think she’s excited to learn more about the NSA and this amazing group Tim is connected to. I think we all could.

How does this loss affect the bros?

Wildland fire brings a diverse mix of people together to accomplish objectives in inconvenient natural environments. Smokejumpjng places two to eight highly trained people on some of the most remote and strategically complex incidents. But there’s much more to this group than the work. We’re all on some sort of Type A spectrum, our eclectic flavors adding to this mix and multiplying our capacity to professionally dominate in our challenging niche. Personally, having seen the comradery of the bros despite our loss, and understanding that events like this, while tragic, are part of the glue that holds us all together, I am so honored to be part of it all. Once a jumper, always a jumper; there’s a bond here beyond words. It feels disrespectful to take personal honor in spite of a brother’s death. I think that’s where the newfound weight of this title, smokejumper, lies, a mantle on all our shoulders.

Working in fire almost predicates an identity complex formed to the profession, especially as one climbs the tiers of the job. Across the fire world there is pride at every specific and important level. We always improve to maintain this fixture of honor of our profession and legacy, and gain a network that transcends our years, qualifications, pedigrees, egos, etc. It starts with that same question every forestry technician hears in gas stations across the country as they fuel the government truck “oh, you’re firefighters… are you smokejumpers?” An innocent challenge to measure greatness, aptitude, sacrifice. Something in the name. Something in those people.

These jumpers – they’re the best of the best. The bros and sis’s of summer, proven, hardy, somehow larger-than-life. Tim’s death hits especially hard for those of us that were not around for Urban, or Sheehey, or Liston, or Thrash. It’s the death not only of our friend, but also the innocence of a lifestyle that seemed far less precarious. The Lost Boys, fire gods falling from the skies, a carefree fire troupe in our ambivalent woods, realized they had a home all along- in this community, bonded by something words don’t and can’t quite describe. One of us died but perhaps all of us died a little, too.

We love the randomness of this job, such that in two minutes you may go from a mundane task to suited up and flying to a place you would never otherwise have known. We cherish this randomness, but it seems a cold randomness now. Especially when we didn’t know who it was that was hurt in New Mexico. Before there was a name, the voicemails that were more like prayers on each of our phones from distraught family members, friends, current and ex-significant others. Assuring them that we were OK, while enduring the torture of mental triage of who else it could be, where they were at in their life, the lives their injury – then, loss – would affect. Was it my RB? Was it someone married, with kids? Realizing that no matter who it is, the fallout is equally unfair. Thinking that the fairest solution is that it should’ve been you. Seeking the wisdom that our story is written by our own hand, but the chapter ends without our discretion. The footnotes filled in by other people at a fancy ceremony, double stamped by those damned bagpipes that turn the hardiest eyes into fountains.

As Tim’s sister Meg said, “Tim won the lottery… I don’t know many people that could say they absolutely love their job and their life, but Tim certainly could. He had the best life, he had it all.” I take courage from her perspective. Courage and the realization that Tim was kinda just like me, like any of us would be, under other circumstances. Courage to live life now as well as he did.

Smokejumper, husband, connoisseur of the finest public lands and human creativity. In that order.

For me, it’ll be surreal being on some future smokejumper trails project (NSA – TRAMPS) in twenty years and talking about Tim and how this event shaped many of our careers and perspectives. That is, if the God-given List plays out for us that way. Oh that we could live life so large.

I guess the simple fact of the matter is that we miss him. Now, as Tim would say, we have to “go on.. get yourselves right.”

In lieu of flowers, Tim’s wife Michelle requests donations in his name to the Wildland Firefighter Foundation, https://wffoundation.org/ .

*The views presented in this article are my own and not representative of any agency, official capacity, or directive.

Patrick McGunagle started his wildland fire career in 2015 on an engine for the Flathead National Forest, then worked on a hotshot crew before joining the smokejumper program in 2019. He is currently with the BLM Great Basin Smokejumpers. Patrick is on the board of the National Smokejumper Association and writes for Smokejumper magazine.