Summer of Fire - Linda Jacobs [32]
The team lined up, spread out, and began to emulate her motions.
“I want it two feet wide, from here down to that dead tree.” She pointed. “And I want it in ten minutes.” A good hotshot team could do the deed in five.
As the troops worked, Clare paced their ranks. “You want to watch out for wind shifts that can send fire speeding in your direction. If flames catch up to your line, you see if it holds. If not, fall back to another position.” She stopped and cautioned a young man, “Hold your Pulaski tighter. You’re going to get a blister.”
She raised her voice. “When you’re on a fire, you may find yourself working up to fifty hours straight without a trip back to a camp. You’ll sleep where you drop, leaned against a tree or stretched out in the dirt of a fire line.”
That was something Clare had yet to experience, but the troops didn’t need to know. It gave her a sense of satisfaction to see Sergeant Travis look unhappy. She hoped the next group would come with a more enlightened commander.
“Snags are standing burned trees,” she went on. “You’d be surprised how slight a breeze can bring one down without a sound. When you’re digging, keep up your awareness of everything around you. Somebody is killed by a snag every season.”
She moved down the line without speaking. A soldier with his head bent over his work formed an attractive target. “Gotcha.” She tapped his shoulder.
He jumped. A chorus of laughter spread.
“Not funny!” she shouted. “He’s a dead man.”
It got quiet fast.
Clare studied the soldiers’ fresh faces. As part of the volunteer Army, they had asked to serve, but in the late eighties, she imagined most thought they’d never see danger.
It took fifteen minutes for them to reach the tree she had set as a goal. She berated them severely although she thought they’d done a credible job for rookies. Gathering the group, she said, “You’ve probably been wondering what was in those pouches I gave you to hang on your belts.”
A number of the young men and women nodded.
Clare unsnapped the flap top of her own pouch and drew out a folded mass of material that looked like silver foil. “This is your last resort in case you are overtaken by flames.”
Their incredulous looks mirrored the disbelief Clare had felt when she was first acquainted with the tissue-thin Mylar shields. She shook it out and the wind caught it, making it billow like a sheet on a clothesline.
“Insert your hands through the corner straps,” she instructed, spreading her arms wide. “Put your boot toes through the bottom corners.” The blanket fluttered behind her like a cape. “If you have time, you’ll clear a patch of bare earth to lie in. If not . . .
Clare heard Sergeant Travis mutter, “Then kiss your ass good-bye.”
She went down onto the ground. For a long moment, she lay still beneath the silver tarpaulin, imagining that choking smoke and superheated air seeped beneath the edges. Without an air pack, she did not believe these things could possibly save lives.
It was quiet in the sunny glade. Insects droned and the wind soughed through pine boughs. Clare imagined the roar of the Shoshone, trees exploding, without the convenience of Yellowstone Lake at her feet.
When she got up, she threw the shelter at Sergeant Travis. He took it, but instead of folding it, he crumpled the foil over his arm. “It’s your turn,” she told the troops. “Break ‘em out and cover up.”
As she watched their awkward rehearsal, a flying tanker headed in from the fires, on a line toward West Yellowstone.
Over a week after ditching, Deering was still grounded. On the tarmac at West Yellowstone Airport, he held tight to the nozzle as he filled a DC-7 tanker with fire retardant.
None of the charter companies he’d hit up wanted help. Every turndown had cut like a blade and he imagined that his wife wielded them all. Not only did Georgia hope his Bell was lost, she’d be dancing if she knew he was a grunt on the ground crew.
As soon as the belly tank was full, the plane taxied toward another bombing run.
Deering removed his goggles and lugged the hose back to the battery