Deciding to keep air resources in reserve for initial attack on new starts rather than wash the fire off chimney tops was a good decision. I am just saying that it is not necessary to lynch someone in order to hold them accountable. People who live in forested areas need to be aware of fire danger. All rights reserved. Watch the pride and ego firefighters: youll never outmatch Gods elements. I always come back to that groupthink mentality, the ladder of inference, the been there done that mode, the failure/fear to act, and thats how weve always done it thinking; all part of how our unconscious brain works without our conscious intervention and critical thinking skills. Tennessee Wildfire Cause: Gatlinburg Fires May Have Been Man-Made I am thankful so many are not only opening their eyes here, but taking action and questioning. We need to question everything and everyone with the same tenacious veracity as the other, but we also need to allow for humans to be human, and engage in the process of learning. He and the other NPS staff there regularly went on out of state assignments. Visibility was so low that other car lights could barely be seen from oncoming cars. I visited Gatlinburg on a trip to Asheville NC, in 1980. This is the path to healing, and the way to light. The report stated the demolition was requested due to the health and safety of the citizens and visitors in the event of a full structure collapse.. Nonetheless, your observations on the 21st indicate that no signs of the 14th fire were present; and if the NPS did fully suppress the first fire, their timeline was undoubtedly non-aggressive to do so. I picked them up and came back home with plans of bringing truck back over mountain and filling it up because it was near empty. November 27th, 35 acres. California couple whose gender-reveal party sparked a wildfire charged I cannot count how many times my wife or I would find a fire smoldering typically from someone who flipped a lit cigarette and the brush when they were finished. Damage was estimated at. I wish the Feds had kept the case instead of handing it off to the local DA. there is still a nagging question regarding the use of BACKFIRE on the part of the NPS and the Gatlinburg Fires? Tom, I want to express to you how sorry I am to hear about the loss of your cabin, what you went through escaping the fire, what you have gone through since the fire and what you are facing. I agree, this has many players to blame and starts with Superintendent Cassius Cash and trickles down to the City and County. As long as there are watchdogs for the truth such yourself, it will be hard to bury. Due to the damage this fire has caused Im sure there will be follow-up effects (and recriminations) for years. In this case, there were no firefighters in a position to take direct action. So my husband called the Gatlinburg policy department with the same questions and got the same answers. Increasing cloudiness and strong southerly winds on Monday ahead of the next storm system. The park should have been begging for help and putting out warnings all week end!!! It is the duty of the people and Congress to maintain and voice our concerns and opinions to where check and balances work. That should have been done over Thanksgiving! We need to hold, that experience though often shared, does not fit into every mold, because in the real world though some laws are universal, there is always changing variable and situations are never really exactly the same. Nearly five years. Person killed in downtown Gatlinburg fire identified. Sweeney, to be honest weve never experienced circumstances quite like this. I thanked her, hung up and told Stanton to go load Ladys kennel. Over 3000 wildfires received Initial Attack in November in the southern Appalachians, many of which were still very active when Chimney Tops 2 started. Thanks for the good fact based, solid coverage of the events leading up to the fire. It is truly appreciated. This eventually will affect us all at some point in time, as we too may one day find ourselves faced with similar circumstance. The Cove Mountain weather station is 8 miles northwest of the origin of the Chimney Tops 2 Fire, 5 miles west of downtown Gatlinburg, and 3 miles west of the last known western edge of the fire. When the Chimney Tops 2 Fire burned into Gatlinburg on November 28, 2016 and destroyed thosestructures it was drivenprimarily by weather specifically, very strong winds. As my husband was carrying things to the car at 5:00PM, a white SUV came by. I think thats pretty cut and dry and yes its their fault that they didnt at least try and do something. We are still dealing but two of us or degree, the emotional loss of losing our beloved cabin but now we are in the rebuild mode. Brian Blanco/Getty. Updated: Dec. 25, 2022 at 6:15 PM PST. One only has to imagine a single downed power line starting a structure fire at the same time the wildfire was approaching to understand how the great loss of property and life actually happened. They did too little, too late. I hear of those who didnt leave until 9:00 that night. GSMNP manager said he couldnt order an evacuation but he surely could have recommended one as the forecast for high winds was given early Sunday. Being that were neighbors with these people, its people that we love. The blame is as simple as the nose on your face we have family that is firemen and friends that are and they too are trained in fighting fires and if they had contained it all of this wouldnt have happened. 2 min read. Experience must be coupled with training and planning based on forecasted possibilities and even un-forecasted what ifs. Im totally with you accountability. The Championship side, who are 19th in the table, said there have been no injuries. 119K views 4 months ago GATLINBURG Many people get worried when they hear the words Gatlinburg and Fire in the same sentence. The public cannot sit on their hands and expect anything to change. Yes. People were ready to leave their home in 15 min. And I dont write about that many of them. Being asleep at the wheel is no excuse. And not only they had time to evacuate but I called 911 Monday night on Nov. 28 2016 and ask if there was any evacuation orders for Gatlinburg and was told By The 911 operator no not at this time Later found out the whole place was on fire at the same time I called 911 ( WHY ) was I lied to ? Many structures were lost- thankfully no lives. Of course Dollywood and Gatlinburg was virtually unscathed. I just hope, like Jeannine, that fire managers can learn from this tragedy because we really need the tool of prescribed fire in the tool box. The reason that is a point is IMT has experience far beyond any fire teams in east TN or GSMNP, especially with wind-driven wildfires. Lets say the NPS put a crew on it day one in steep inaccessible terrain as they say it was in. Im not saying IMTs are perfect (and no doubt there are background politics involved), but they sure appeared to do an awesome job coming to the situation with a big view and didnt hesitate to get the job done and keep the public informed. 321) at Glades Road and the Post Office. The status of individual structures in the Gatlinburg area can be found at arcgiscom. How many sorties could those planes do in an single day even if they had been deployed on Even Friday?? Even so, is it risky to ignite backfire with such extreme fire conditions? But any land manager that expects to allow active spreading fire behavior for weeks or months is knowingly taking a risk that a wind event unpredictable weeks or months in advance will occur and change everything, sometimes with a very undesirable outcome. Yet no one made a move. I hounded the Knox News editor for a followup article around Dec. 19. My family lives 15 mi. I keep up with what is going on nationwide and every time I hear about a monitored or let burn fire that escapes the maximum management area, I write about it. Take my word for it, Ive seen back scratching going on down there for over 40 years. We spent Thanksgiving there with our family, who left on Sunday. > Jeannine In my 40 years in the fire service (Calif and Alaska), I have seen an unfortunate number of cases where agencies in generaland the NPS in particulardesignate fires as monitored event(s) (insert favorite agency terminology here) that hours, or days, later explode into huge incidents. A little later the local TV news reported the fire had crossed the road and was headed up the mountain behind the Park Vista. Here is a question & answer from Bill interviewing Tom Nichols on Wildfire Today: One of the more common errors in judgment you have seen on fires? The NPS, IMO, did not take an aggressive stance on this fire, and that is usually the case with them. They had their moment in history and did not rise to it. Thank you for making a point of the fact that we are all human beings with faults by design so that we need each other to succeed and survive. But I believe there is a fourth element of fire behavior prediction and that is the element of situational awareness. It is no wonder that the people do not trust Government. Much needed rainfall is expected on Monday with additional rainfall possible through Wednesday. Their soft wood holds a lot of moisture normally, but the conditions the past few months would have dried the limbs and outer layers up the trunk. National Park Service says never push a slower friend down when escaping a bear, Knoxville utilities crews work to restore power after intense storms, Missing elderly Knoxville woman last seen at hospital, police say, Vols drop to 5-seed in SEC Tournament after falling at Auburn, 79-70. fire Sunday morning destroyed their building. When human death is involved, there should be accountability, even if there is unintentional negligence. Down hemlocks are mostly just gone. There was lots of sunlight and lots of low-level vegetation so much that the trail was overgrown and we decided to turn around. When the fire started on Chimney Tops I thought surely the National Park Service would take necessary steps to put it out quickly because of the sure danger of it spreading. Earlier on Tuesday, media reported that a man was arrested for setting three fires that spread into a 300-acre fire in. On November 23 when the fire was discovered the KBDI was 599, Molly Schroer, a spokesperson for the IMT told us. So many unanswered questions? Hindsight is 20/20 and of course much coulda woulda shoulda is understandable. Do we need to learn from it. Back home in West TN, when tornado warnings were active in a particular area there were loud sirens that went off. Fire kills 1, destroys businesses in downtown Gatlinburg, Tenn Wildfire Today covered engines being shipped from CA. Prescribed burning is a critical ecosystem management tool across the nation, especially in the Southeast (https://goodfires.org/how) and when the term is used interchangeably with monitored wildfires it can lead to confusion. Even the courts of law no longer put as heavy weight on personal testimony, as so much has been proven to so easily be manipulated and affected by a host of factors. The winds that Monday afternoon had knocked power lines down and early reporting made mention of separate ignition points in the residential hillsides. But the condition of the fuel was also important since it happenedduring what the National Weather Service (NWS) calls exceptional drought conditions. My husband stopped the car and the two men inside identified themselves as city water department employees. Yes, good points Jody. What authority does NPS have outside GSMNP? Why were there so many wildfires being lit by arsonists all of a sudden this year? Also. Crews working a Gatlinburg structure fire that began early Sunday morning discovered a body. Any person involved in any sort of firefighting/fire ecology/fire control/fire management profession learns these basic fire physic scientific principals from day oneeither from formal training or through hands on fire behavior observations . Yet no one will be severely punished i.e. Aircraft dropping water or fire retardant on a fire cannot put it out. Gatlinburg Fire Cause: Who Started the Wildfire? | Heavy.com From 7 p.m. until midnight sustained winds were at 13 to 17 mph with gusts from 34 to 49. Incident Mgt. Situational awareness to current and predicted variables, as well as the potential of possibility is key. Now he has the benefit of another 60 to 90 days of another investigation before anything officially or otherwise will be said. They had no sirens or Claxons blaring, no shouting to evacuate thru their grill mounted speakers. I am positive that for anyone who gives of themselves to protect and serve will forever be haunted by that far more than anyone of us can expect to hold them accountable by lynching. Henry, do you know the effect of the typical southeastern forest ground fires on the hemlock adelgid? Question, seek truth and evidence, get to the roots, with the intention to create and apply solutions, not simply hang someone; that is how we grow forward! Still cant seem to get any answers if the BACKFIRES got out of control when the NPS ignited them contributing to the loss of life and structures in Gatlinburg??? We had better see something besides suggestions for new warning systems and making people that are rebuilding their homes put in overly expensive sprinkler systems that way they can say to the press they made major strides and changes and they learned from the fire. Nearby businesses feel the same. Jody, you have said well what Ive wanted to say from my impressions made after the fire about this tragic situation. If the new location isnt in Gatlinburg, it will definitely be in Sevier County. Its always been this way so you have to watch who you deal with, this is why the City and County need to clean this up, this would bring down the prices of these people with signs up everywhere for clean up. No evacuation orders issued- If I had gone to work that day my two sons would be dead. Approximately 14,000 residents were originally forced to evacuate. Gatlinburg is in Sevier County. Those businesses were also protected from the fire. Travelers are urged to avoid the area at this time. Gatlinburg businesses look to rebuild after massive fire The aptly named Fire Cherry, Beech and Mtn. I agree that there needs to to be a change of attitude about climate change, wildfire potential in the east, an adaptation to changing conditions and a throwing out of the holding on to the been there done that, know all there is to know, seen this before thinking and the holding onto a world that used to be. Below is the stateof access to the fire area, as reported by the IMT: The National Park is closed from the Gatlinburg Entrance to Smokemont near Oconaluftee (US 441, Newfound Gap) and Little River Road from Sugarlands Visitor Center to Townsend. In wildfire-riddled Tennessee, climate change is a hot topic Between 2 p.m. and 6 p.m.they increased to 7 to 15 mph with gusts of 22 to 32 mph all generally out of the south, blowing toward Gatlinburg. Maybe within the next year, well see some kind of progress come together, said Neddo. It's always sad to see the destructive forces of Mother Nature. Like hell he did. The truck was filled with firefighters. Former Gatlinburg fire chief reflects as new wildfires burn - WTVF The Great Smoky Mountains National Park Facebook page reported (on Monday 11/28 at 1046am) that gusting winds have caused the fire to spot across the ridges in the Chimney Tops and Bull head Ridge Area. Chief Kurtz was right on target to compare South Canyon, Yarnell, and now Chimney Top 2. Many on that team are not NPS employees, but are highly experienced wildfire fighters. By the time the troops were called in, it was too late. Report: Gatlinburg fire caused $7 million in damages I hope this video puts people at ease that this fire is. The fire was reported to be near the Twin Creeks Picnic Center at 1130. Nothing happens in a vacuum. Im sorry but that initial fire management at the outset was atrocious. I am like you in that I will never be able to get a good nights sleep on the mountain again as Im all be consistently looking out the window. City prosecutors have charged a longtime Mililani High School leader with multiple counts of theft. Yes, there is backside-covering going on. Analyzing the fire that burned into Gatlinburg - Wildfire Today The Gatlinburg Fire Department was dispatched to the 700 block of Parkway in downtown Gatlinburg at 6:39 a.m. on October 9. I called Bob back and told him I was leaving hurriedly and that I would call him when we had made it out of woods to Pigeon Forge. Before we got in the car, we each took photos of the approaching fire with our cell phones. I spent two weeks in the area after the fire to inspect my property and ascertain where my wife and I would go from there. The teens, 15 and 17, were charged with starting the Chimney Tops fire which eventually spread to the Smoky Mountains, into Sevier County and Gatlinburg, killing 14 people, injuring more than. Our house was in a direct N/S line from the Chimneys. Excellent points, Jody. Many are willing to allow the absolute open permission to some to behave as they will without question, but are unwilling to allow others the same room to learn and grow.

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