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S A F E N E T
Wildland Fire Safety & Health Reporting Network
Report unsafe situations in all wildland fire operations. |
ID # 7H2GC9SAFE |
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Name : (Optional) |
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Phone : (Optional) |
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EMail : (Optional) |
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Date Reported : |
07/30/2008 |
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Agency/Organization : |
BIA |
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State Agency : |
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Other Agency : |
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Event Date : |
06/22/2008 |
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Local Time : |
12:00 PM |
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Incident Name : |
BEAUTIFUL MTN. FIRE |
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Incident Number : |
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State : |
NM |
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Jurisdiction : |
BIA |
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Local Unit : |
Navajo |
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Incident Type : |
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Incident Activity : |
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Stage of Incident : |
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Wildland |
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Transport to/from |
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Initial Attack |
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Position Title : |
Fmo, Ic, Engines |
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Task : |
Travel To And From Incident By Fmo |
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Management Level : |
5 |
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Resources Involved : |
Equipment, Overhead |
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Contributing Factors : |
Human Factors |
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Human Factors : |
Decision Making; Fatigue; Leadership; Performance; Situational Awareness |
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Other Factors : |
FMO |
| Describe in detail what happened including the concern or potential issue, the environment (weather, terrain, fire behavior, etc), and the resulting safety/health issue. |
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On the evening of June 22, the fire manager was leaving the Beautiful Mtn. Incident at a late hour. He was driving too fast on sandy, winding mountain roads in the dark in unfamiliar terrain. Not far from the incident, where the road curved, the fire manager's vehicle slid off the road, stopping on the edge of a hill with both driver side wheels off the ground. The fire manager tried to call someone from the incident on the radio, but the only person he could contact was the IC. He could not tell the IC where he was because he did not have a GPS unit with him. The fire manager ordered IC off of the fire to come and find him, in the dark. The fire manager got out of his vehicle and began to walk back up the road he'd come down, using only his headlamp for light. After a couple of hours of walking around, for about 3 miles, in what he believed was the direction back to the fire, the IC and one engine operator finally spotted the fire manager by seeing the headlamp on his helmet. They picked him up and returned to base, leaving the fire and the fire manager's vehicle behind.
Early the next morning, a new IC was appointed. When the new IC got to the ICP, it was abandoned. When the fire manager and engines arrived later, the fire manager ordered the IC and the engine personnel to assist him in getting his vehicle unstuck. When they finally located the vehicle, in the daylight they could see how close the fire manager had come to rolling his vehicle downhill. The personnel and engine were used to push & pull the fire manager's vehicle out of the sand and get it back on four wheels on the road. The fire manager threatened them if they told anyone about the accident.
Unbeknownst to the fire manager, two personnel took photos of the vehicle before it was rescued - one with a camera phone and one with a digital camera. Afterwards, when anyone at the compound mentioned the accident, the fire manager threatened them if they spoke about it. |
SUGGESTED CORRECTIVE ACTION |
| Reporting Individual : Please list anything that, if changed, would prevent this safety issue in the future. |
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This fire manager is unfit for his position and fire roles. He needs to be removed from the position as he frequently exhibits unsafe behavior and unwise management practices. He's going to get someone hurt or killed. |
| Please document how you tried to resolve the problem and list anything that, if changed, would prevent this safety issue in the future. |
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All personnel were threatened if they spoke of the accident at all. We don't believe that the fire manager's own boss even knows about the accident. If this had happened to one of the manager's subordinates, the manager would have written them up and/or fired them. The only thing that will prevent this type of incident in the future is to have this manager removed from the position. |
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