The most significant unanswered question about the 19 fatalities on the 2013 Yarnell Hill Fire is, why did the Granite Mountain Hotshots leave the safety of a previously burned area and walk through unburned brush toward a ranch. Undoubtedly some of the firefighters that were working on the fire heard radio transmissions during which the order to relocate was discussed, but due to lawyering-up and the refusal of the U.S. Forest Service to allow their firefighters to provide information, other firefighters may never know why or by whom that fateful decision was made.
It is possible that a simple device costing less than $200 could have recorded the fireground radio transmissions and this issue could have been settled within hours of the accident. And a lesson may have been learned, preventing other firefighters from making the same mistake.
Cockpit voice recorders in an aircraft capture conversations and radio transmissions, dash cameras in law enforcement vehicles record audio and video, and recently there have been recommendations that every police officer wear a body camera.
One of the recommendations from investigators following the death of Dallas firefighter Stanley Wilson, and earlier than that, Dallas Lt. Todd Krodle, was that on-scene radio transmissions be recorded.
Firefighter Wilson’s widow, Jenny, said she had one simple wish: that fireground radio transmissions be recorded. After the Dallas FD balked at spending the money, FirefighterCloseCalls looked into recording devices. Here is an excerpt from their article:
…Stop the bullsh*t—a system that records repeated or simplex radio transmissions won’t break the City-or most any other jurisdiction. It can be done through a central location or battalion chief buggies can be equipped with them…simple fireground recorders. And you don’t even need to form a committee.
As an example, I searched and found www.FireVideo.net and for much less than $200.00 each, you can have a dash (or rear of command buggy) recorder with audio and video for every buggy-it can record over 10 hours and it automatically turns on.
So let’s just say the “big D” has 9 battalions and a few other senior chiefs/safety officers etc per shift. So, for about $2000.00 total, EVERY on-duty DFR buggy has a working, state of the art recorder. That’s less than it will cost to buy lunch at the next city council meeting. Where there’s a will, there’s a way. That was easy.
Either way, it’s 2015 and it’s ridiculous to not be able to go back and listen to fireground channels-after fires that went well or ones such as this one where Captain Wilson was tragically killed.
Look, if we can go on the Internet and watch Freddie firefighter with his helmet cam stretch a booster line to a raging mulch bed on fire, fireground channels can be recorded right at the buggy. It may cost some a little money, but that’s the price of putting a sign in front of a building and calling it the “FIRE DEPT”.
Recording fireground radio transmissions on a wildland fire is very different from recording those at a structure fire, but that does not mean it is impossible, or that we should throw up our hands and say it can’t be done. Low power direct transmissions from hand held radios do not travel much beyond line of sight, but if there were a few recording devices in vehicles scattered around a fire there is a chance that a key conversation could be recorded that might later lead toward a lesson learned.
It would not be a perfect system. Not every channel would be recorded, and some would be missed. But for less than $200 per Battalion Chief’s vehicle, a National Forest, a state agency, or a county fire department with a heavy wildland responsibility should experiment with a few devices.
