Remembering the Granite Mountain Hotshots 12 years later

Emotional memorial marks 12 years since Yarnell Hill Fire tragedy

We're hearing from Yarnell residents who are remembering the tragic Yarnell Hill Fire that claimed the lives of 19 Granite Mountain Hotshots. FOX 10's Kenzie Beach has this story.

YARNELL, Ariz. - Monday, June 30, marks 12 years since 19 members of the Granite Mountain Hotshots were killed while battling the Yarnell Hill Fire.

What they're saying:

Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs ordered flags to fly at half-staff from sunrise to sunset in memory of the firefighters.

"We honor the memory and legacy of the 19 Granite Mountain Hotshots who sacrificed their lives to keep Arizonans safe," Hobbs said in a news release. "Their bravery and service to our state will always be remembered, and we are holding their families, friends and the entire Prescott community in our thoughts."

Local perspective:

A ceremony was held at the Granite Mountain Tribute Center in Prescott at 2 p.m.

There was also a remembrance event at the Yarnell Hill Fire Memorial Park at 4 p.m.

"These men were selfless people who were loved by their community and respected by the industry of wildland firefighting professionals. These were fathers, they were husbands, and they were sons. I thought about that as a daughter, as a mother, and as a spouse. Here in Yarnell, and the surrounding communities, their sacrifices are remembered daily," a speaker said at Yarnell Hill Fire Memorial Park.

"I guess the emotion is remembering partly what some of that trauma was like that day, that week, those next couple of years," Frances Lechner, president of the Yarnell Hill Recovery Group, said.

Granite Mountain Hotshots remembered 12 years later

FOX 10's Kenzie Beach reports from an emotional memorial for the 19 firefighters who died while battling the Yarnell Hill Fire. It was the deadliest fire in Arizona's history.

Tom Columbus' home burned down during the fire.

"We got in the car, we’re leaving. I’m driving out. I look over my shoulder and I see it looks like a horror movie, you know, the ominous smoke …," Columbus recalled.

Jim Kellmann has been a resident of Yarnell for 25 years.

"The fires coming to our house. You know, all a sudden, the wind shifted and that's when they got the men in the tunnel," he said, recalling the fateful day.

‘If I only knew …’

"Oh, if I only knew where they were, I would have got them out because they had passed away like a thousand feet from the back of our house," Columbus  said.

Yarnell turned devastation to recovery, and is now a nationally recognized firewise community as it works to prevent tragedies like this one from happening again.

The backstory:

When the fire started, dry lightning had struck a patch of vegetation in steep, mountainous terrain and ignited the fire high on a ridge west of Yarnell, which hadn’t experienced a wildfire in nearly 50 years.

Two days later, the Hotshots were battling the fire in a box canyon when the winds suddenly shifted and the flames rapidly raced toward them. The 19 men tried to deploy emergency shelters: tent-like structures meant to shield firefighters from the flames and heat.

The gusty, hot winds caused the fire to intensify to more than 2,000 degrees and cut off the firefighters’ escape route, killing the men, authorities said.

The only surviving crew member, Brendan McDonough, was posted away from the group as a lookout when the flames overtook the other Hotshots.

The Yarnell Hill Fire charred more than 13 square miles and destroyed 127 buildings.