Incident Name: Glen Allen Fire above Altadena, CA
Date: 8/20/93
Personnel: 2 lives lost
Age:
Agency/Organization: Crew Camp Two in La Canada Flintridge, Los Angeles County Fire Department
Position: Fire Suppression Aid Fly Crewman
Summary:
Christopher D. Herman, 25, firefighter from LAC Camp 2
Arthur Ruezga, 33, crew leader of Crew 2-2
Los Angeles County Fire Department and the Angeles National Forest responded to an urban interface fire in Altadena CA. Among the resources responding was Crew 2-2, a brush initial air attack unit with Copter 15. The crew was off-loaded 300′ above the fire on the west side.
Approximately 35-40 minutes after Crew 2-2 off loaded the fire became very active on its west flank. The crew had advanced down the western side of the ridge that they were on. After a short break, some planning and assessment of alternatives, they decided to continue on down the hill to continue cutting line along the advancing fire edge. During a 5-10 minute period the fire flared up, grew to it’s eventual size and Crew 2-2 was entrapped. The two firefighters died and two were critically burned. The Glen Allen Fire was 34 acres located in Altadena.
Alternative description: On August 20, 1993, on rugged hillside section of Altadena, CA, Arthur Ruesga, age 34 and Christopher Herman, age 25, died when they were burned over while fighting a brush fire. They, and the rest of their 8-man crew, had been dropped off by a helicopter on a hillside above the fire. The fire spotted, catching the two men and others in their crew between the spot and the main fire. In such a case, the main fire pulls the spot towartds itself, sometimes with unusual ferocity. Two other firefighters on the crew were badly burned.
Maps
Burnover Location above Altadena
{mosmap lat=’34.196300’|lon=’-118.11206’|marker=’0’|text=’Accident Location’}
Reports, Documentation, Lessons Learned
- LA County Fire Department and Angeles National Forest: Glen Allen Incident Entrapment Investigation Report (4,456 KB pdf)
- Herman’s and Ruezga’s names and death date are included in the USFA Firefighter Fatality Retrospective Study, published April 2002 (2,888 K pdf)
- Doug Campbell: BEHAVE & CPS Risk Mitigation Model: wind, sun and solar heating in alignment.
- For easy reading, Glen Allen info offered at Colorado Fire Camp website
- Wildland Fire Lessons Learned Center: You Tube video: Loop and Glen Allen Case Studies
- We Can Correct Years of Flawed Training by JP HARRIS On Sep 1, 2010
Return to top
Wildlandfire.com Links:
- Hotlist: Glen Allen
Media Articles and Reports.
- 2 Firefighters Die, 4 Hurt Battling BlazeAug 21, 1993 | Online Article
- The fire, one of three that erupted in dry, brushy parts of the county, threatened homes only briefly before winds drove it into the Angeles National Forest, said county Fire Inspector Jack Pritchard. Two men from a civilian fire crew dropped by helicopter were killed when the blaze jumped to a spot near them, then trapped them as it burned rapidly uphill, fire officials said.
“They got between the fire and a spot fire,” Pritchard said, calling the incident unusual in a region plagued by seasonal brush fires. “It’s probably at least 10 years or more since any county firefighters have been killed during a brush fire. (But) I wouldn’t say it’s a fluke thing. It’s one of those things that happen at brush fires all over the country.”
The names of the two firefighters killed were not released. They were described as members of an eight-man camp crew, a team of mostly young, entry-level firefighters who were creating a line around portions of the fire. They worked in conjunction with water-dropping helicopters, Pritchard said.
The Altadena blaze, which broke out at 3 p.m., may have been ignited by a car fire, but authorities were still investigating its cause, Pritchard said. By late evening, about 100 firefighters had managed to fully contain the brush fire, he added. (More at the beginning at the link)
- Deaths of 2 Firefighters in Altadena Still Mystery : Investigation: Co-workers at Crew Camp Two are still in shock over ‘typical’ blaze that turned deadly. Two remain hospitalized.August 26, 1993 | Online Article
SAN GABRIEL VALLEY — Stricken with shock and sorrow in the wake of last week’s typical-turned-deadly brush fire in Altadena, firefighters at Crew Camp Two in La Canada Flintridge struggled to get on with business as usual this week.
“We work together, live together and fight fires together. Something like this is devastating,” county Fire Department Chief P. Michael Freeman said of the two firefighters who were killed and two who were seriously burned from Crew Camp Two.
“It brings firefighters face to face with their own mortality,” he said during an interview at the Sherman Oaks Hospital Burn Center, where the injured men remained Wednesday, one in serious condition and the other in critical condition.
What went wrong after the eight-man team from Crew Camp Two was dropped off by a helicopter on a hillside above the fire is still under investigation. Little has been added this week to the scant details already released, but Freeman said a preliminary report on the investigation may be completed within a week.
- Did anyone ever address the question of whether the rotor wash from the helicopter could have created the spot fire? In recent years, communication and coordination between aviation and ground forces have become much more extensive.)
- 1000 Firefighters Attend Funerals of 2 ColleaguesAugust 27, 1993 | Online Article
Nearly 1,000 firefighters from across Southern California paid tribute Thursday to two of their own killed a week ago in an Altadena blaze that overran an eight-member crew in steep terrain. The funerals for Arthur Ruezga, 33, of Valinda and Christopher Drake Herman, 25, of Downey marked the first time in 25 years that county wild-land firefighters have been killed in a brush fire.
“The county (Fire Department) has fought over 20,000 wild-land fires since one of our own has fallen,” said Chief P. Michael Freeman, who spoke Thursday morning at a Pico Rivera church during funeral services for Ruezga.
So-called fire suppression aides such as Ruezga and Herman are trained to fight wilderness fires and are paid about $75 a day. They are temporary employees working on an annual basis, usually in hopes of landing a better-paying position as a sworn firefighter. They use chain saws, picks, shovels and other hand tools to cut break lines around fires to keep them from spreading. (Much more at the link)
Photos, Videos, & Tributes
- USFA Memorial Database: Christopher Herman | Arthur Ruezga
- Plaque with cross on the Altadena Crest Trail:Photo and comments at the Wildland Firefighter Foundation Facebook page Photo taken on a wildland firefighter Staff Ride in 2014.
- Link to another striking photo of the memorial site by Petrea Buchard
Contributors to this article: Gerald Meehan, Larry Tucker, LAC; Doug Campbell, Mellie, Wildland Firefighter Foundation
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