One Foot in The Black

A WildFire is one hell of a spectacle, from far away. From far away you can see the dark gray and black smoke billowing up into the sky until it breaks through the clouds above it. The glow that comes off of it at night keeps your interest. You fall asleep after posting pictures of it to social media with “this fire is terrifyingly beautiful”.

Photo taken by me

You wake up the morning only to realize the fire is now one very short mile from your doorstep. Suddenly that beautiful distant fire isn’t such a beautiful thing after all. It’s a monster, a monster that you can now smell, and hear in the distance. It creates a sound like a train rumbling by. You grab a few things and open your front door to leave. And there, walking up your driveway, and in the direction of the cloud of smoke that is now burning your eyes is a group of individuals smiling and joking with one another and waving to you as they pass you by.

Photo taken by me

To that group of individuals THAT moment, walking towards a fire that everyone else is running away from. That’s the moment we live for. Some people say we are batshit crazy, adrenaline junkies or lunatics. All are correct lol, truth is I think you have to have a screw lose in order to enjoy the work that we do. If you ever get the chance to have a conversation with a Wild Land firefighter just ask them if they like their job... Then watch them as they smile from ear to ear and tell you that they couldn’t imagine doing anything else. 99% of the time, that’s the reaction you will get.

Photo taken by me

The fun Starts when the saw Team is called up to start cutting line, trimming trees and brushing along the fires edge. When that first saw starts up everyone in the squad is putting gloves on and getting ready for the hardest work they have ever done in their lives.

Photo Taken by Me

Eyes burning, Snot running, glasses fogging up from sweat and your muscles screaming at you with every swing and chop of your tool. Everybody side by side embracing the suck. Nobody stops, stopping means someone else has to swing harder to pick up your slack. Everyone understands the risks of stoping. The homes behind you with people entire lives just waiting to be turned to ash with one wrong move on your part or one strong push on the fires.

(Cabins burning on the Brianhead fire 2017)
Photo taken my Me

And that’s only the second to worst possible thing that could happen. Hence the caption of this post “One Foot in The Black”. Keeping one foot in the Black (burned area) quite literally means keeping one foot in the Black and the other in the green (unburned area aka fuels waiting to be burned). Doing this is often the difference between life and death. Unburned fuels between you and the fire means the fire could easy turn with a wind shift and you will be caught dead where you stand. Keeping one foot in the Black prevents that from happening. If you have ever seen the movie “Only The Brave” towards the end they talk about pulling back into the Black. The Black is the safest spot to be when the fire changes direction or suddenly gains speed. The term “good hard black” is used often to describe a spot that is 100% safe for you to sit and wait for the fire to die down a bit before going back at it.

Photo taken by me

I hope this post didn’t bore anyone that took the time to read it. It is a story style post but it is explaining the job that I have and love. In hopes that people can have a better understanding at what makes people choose the life of chasing down one of mother nature’s scariest beasts’. In the end I do because I love this land, and I love the wildlife that resides in it. I fight like hell to save as much land as I can in order for the beauty of it to last for the generations that will come after us. But even when we are fighting to stop a fire from spreading, sometimes we are forced to pull back and watch as it charges on in front of us and in that moment even though it is destroying everything in its path it is still a beautiful sight to see.