Incident Name: Kyle Fire on the Riverside Ranger Unit
Date: 8/17/1965
Personnel: Melvon Miller
Age: 51
Agency/Organization: CDF (now CAL FIRE)
Position: firefighter
Summary: On August 17, 1965, CDF Firefighter Melvon Miller died while fighting the Kyle Fire on the Riverside Ranger Unit. According to the Desert Sun (a local paper) news article, he died of a heart attack at the scene of a structure fire in Indio. CDF (now CALFIRE) was the contracting agency for local fire protection, so he was a full-time CDF employee working at a county-funded fire station. The fact that there’s a record in the National Wildfire Coordinating Group (NWCG) records indicates that the Kyle Fire was a wildland fire. He might have been structure protection or a structure fire may have progressed to the wildland. (It is unlikely he was fighting only a structure fire.) NWCG records from that time often did not include cause of death or remarks.
Maps
Kyle Fire, Indio, CA
Reports, Documentation, Lessons Learned
- From NWCG Fire Fatality Record: Historical Wildland Firefighter Fatalities 1910 – 1996 (407 K pdf)Date: 1965
Fire Name / Location: Kyle Fire, Riverside RU, CA
1 fatality
Agency: CDF
Fire behavior observed: Unknown
Remarks: none
- From 1965 CA Memorial Wall database. This is the only CDF Riverside Ranger Unit fatality in 1965:Melvon Miller
Agency: CDF
Date: 8/17/1965
No info on cause of death
- California, Death Index: Melvon L MillerName: Melvon L Miller
Event Type: Death
Event Date: 17 Aug 1965
Event Place: Riverside County, California, United States
Birth Date: 03 Feb 1913
Birthplace: Oklahoma
Gender: Male
Father’s Name:
Mother’s Name: Cabe
Age: 51
Wildlandfire.com Links:
Media Articles and Reports
Photos, Videos, & Tributes
- California Memorial Firefighter Wall in Sacramento, CA: California Memorial LODDs by Wall Order. (84 K pdf) –see page 11
Contributors to this article: Redgroom, Mellie
Please support the Wildland Firefighter Foundation
