Rogue columnist: Young men and fire (Yarnell fire)

[DesertRat]

Smokejumpers and other wildfire-fighters call them "shake and bakes," the portable shelters they carry. These cocoons of foil and fiberglas offer the firefighters at best a 50-percent chance and are deployed as a last resort, as when the wind shifts and the living devil of fire traps and turns on them. The hope is that the fire will pass over quickly. Otherwise, "the only thing your shake and bake will do is allow you to have an open-casket funeral,” one crew supervisor told Wired. Such dark humor is a necessary component of dangerous, sometimes deadly jobs. The Prescott Fire Department's Granite Mountain Hotshots team reportedly deployed its shake-and-bakes Sunday in a conflagration at Yarnell, amid triple-digit temperatures and high winds. Nineteen died. As I write, the fire is at zero containment.
{Snip}
Here is what I don't want: Cheap sentimentalizing and cynical religiosity from politicians who are otherwise hostile to public employees, adequate government budgets and sensible land-use policies. The ones who use public pensions and unions as evil hand-puppets to distract citizens from the screwing they are getting from the plutocrats. The tax cutters and climate-change "deniers." Please spare me your sudden compassion for public servants and first responders. Spare me your flags and "USA! USA!" and endless evocation of "heroes" if this is mere denial and lazy thinking. Look: I get the shock and grief. I used to be a first responder myself, cross-trained to deploy with forestry fire teams, and more than once was nearly killed (in the city). I know those men are with the Lord and all their tears have been dried, and I pray that their families are given comfort and grace. But I am not going to endlessly tweet this or post it on Facebook. We owe them more. Read on if you agree. This will not be a popular column. It is a necessary one.

http://www.roguecolumnist.com/rogue_columnist/2013/07/young-men-and-fire.html

[Moonwalk]

1. K&R! This is an awesome article and it should be spread, well, like wildfire--

Don't just kick this one, folks. Repost it everywhere you can, tweet the link. Not just because of the really important message (messages!), but because excellent journalistic writing like this is rarely seen now--and anything that could inspire a new generation of journalists to write like this, to investigate and create real news like this should be encouraged, encouraged, encouraged...

This is a keeper. I can only hope it does spark a fire.

[DesertRat]

2. It's a thoughtful and potentially controversial article.

I hope the message spreads. Thanks.

[DesertRat]

3. bump