Jesse Gunther

At midnight, Millard County Fire Warden Howard Allred was exhausted. It was the second day of the already deadly Milford Flat Fire. The fire had spread to 160,000 acres and was hotter, faster and more erratic than any other fire he had seen in his decades of experience. Wherever he turned, the fire was threatening something.

Earlier, he and fire units from Fillmore and Delta had tried to prevent the fire from jumping the freeway while he assigned volunteers, John Hogan and his son, to put the fire out at Cove Fort. He felt responsible for their safety and hoped the next day would be less dangerous.

The Hogans had left their team along I-15 at mile marker 148 and ran to their fire station to fill their old military tanker. The tanker was once used to carry fuel to GIs, but now its 2,500-gallon tank was used as a portable reservoir for putting out fires. John Hogan had no idea what to expect at the fort, but knowing how erratic the fire had become, he wanted to get to it as soon as he could. He knew the tanker and his help would be invaluable to their efforts out there.

Hogan and his family moved from California years ago to hunt elk. He loved the thrill of the hunt and his wife was anxious for a change. Utah seemed like a nice enough place, and they enjoyed the quiet, dusty town of Kanosh. There they could have a nice home and be part of a community.

Hogan was the unofficial head of the volunteer fire department and worried about its future. It was only staffed by volunteers, and they were running out of them. Few people wanted to train to fight fires, especially when they wouldn't receive any pay. The community's demographic didn't help either. Young people weren't moving to Kanosh, and fires are fought by young people.

Hogan wasn't young anymore. At 58, he thought he was getting too old for this type of thing. But resources were scarce and options were limited. The wind had changed and he knew the fire was headed toward Cove Fort and would be there within the hour. On the way there, Hogan decided his son would drive the tanker while he worked the hose alongside whoever else was out there. They hoped to be done in minutes. But when they arrived, he was shocked to see flames quickly moving toward Cove Fort's south and west sides. Thirty-foot high plumes of fire and smoke surrounded the fort.

Hogan thought back to his training days. This was no ordinary brush fire; he knew he needed to go back to the basics.

He strained to look through the smoke and fire to see who else was there to help but he could only see volunteer missionaries inside the Fort conducting tours. He yelled to them to get out as soon as possible.

"You don't understand! The fire is coming this way! You need to leave here now!" he shouted.

He hoped they wouldn't get caught inside, but he had warned them and that was all he could do; he had to get to the fire. As far as he knew, he and his son were alone, two people and 2,500 gallons poised to fight against a fierce and unpredictable fire.

Hogan's adrenaline pumped as he scrambled on top of the military tanker. He told his son to drive along the southern side of the fort and try to get him as close to the fire as he could. He was glad he had a high-powered nozzle but regretted the fact that he didn't have time to grab the longer hose. He was stuck trying to balance on the convex top of the metal tanker while controlling hundreds of gallons of water with only a three-inch-long hose.

"What ... are you doing? Move me closer," he yelled as he tried to spray the fire at its roots and soak the ground in front. His son, his namesake, was busy trying to move the tanker close to the fire without hitting the ditches. He knew his father would bounce off the top if he did.

Just a day earlier the younger John had been at home in Las Vegas and was getting ready to go out with friends. He had had a lot to drink, and his head reminded him of it every time the tanker hit a ditch. But his 6-foot-3 physique could handle a lot. He worked in construction but had remained a volunteer firefighter like his father. In Vegas, however, firefighters spent more time fighting fires in buildings rather than the outdoors. He knew his way around wildfires, though, and was not afraid of a little danger. Wearing jeans and sneakers, which could easily melt in the heat of the fire, he was in danger.

This didn't faze him, though; he was used to being in dangerous situations. A year earlier he saw a woman get into a head-on collision and without thinking ran to her car, jumped on its flame-engulfed hood and bent back the steering wheel that had pinned her in her seat. Reminiscent of a "Die Hard" movie, the car was engulfed by flames as he carried her away. Of course, he didn't think of this as an act of heroism.

"Hero stuff is for movies" he would often say. This was real life, this was his job.

His father had called him at 10:30 that morning.

"You need to get ... up here right now!" He immediately hung up, grabbed whatever gear he had on hand and raced at light-speed to meet his father on I-15.

That morning a bomber had flown over the fire and told the incident commander that it was getting dangerously close to the freeway just west of Kanosh. If the wind blew east it would push the fire over the freeway and into the cheat grass. Once it hit the cheat grass, it would spread furiously toward Kanosh and the mountains. Once it hit the mountains there would be no stopping it.

The fire was hungry for cheat grass, which, because of the wet spring, was thriving in the area. Locals had been trying to get rid of the non-native grass for decades but had given up. Its hearty nature was too much to compete with. Instead, ranchers tried to graze their cattle in the plants when they were in their first two weeks of maturity. After that, the plant's spines were distasteful to livestock.

If the fire moved east over the freeway the cheat grass would carry it uphill toward Kanosh and residents' homes would be destroyed.

Hogan and his wife, Debbie, had settled on the northern part of Kanosh in a home built in the 19th century. They had spent years decorating and revamping it, and Debbie was not finished. If she had her way, she would pop out the storage room attic and replace the wood with glass. This would become their reading and sitting room.

Hogan had just bought a 63-inch plasma TV for which Debbie eventually found room. Their living room was the only room in the house large enough to accommodate it. The room was decorated with evidence of hunting conquests that Hogan was quick to point out were his son's handiwork. He also proudly displayed his wife's nature paintings and told guests she was responsible for them. He liked his home, family and community. He was a happy man.

There was an eerie feeling in Kanosh as Debbie Hogan left her home that day. The wind had just shifted east and was blowing all the smoke into town. The thick, black smoke and soot covered the sun, so at 3 in the afternoon it looked as if it were midnight. Even the automatic street lights switched on. She was going to deliver lunches to firefighters stationed at the Milford High School. Along with her husband and son, she was a volunteer firefighter, but she didn't see too much action. She often complained to her husband about that. "Why am I even on the force?" He told her it was because she could cook so well. Everyone loved Debbie, partially because of the food she made but more for the understanding that she had of firefighting. She was a fully certified volunteer and even held station records for equipment drills. She was their wise mascot and station mom.

As she drove on I-15 toward Milford High, she could barely see 10 feet ahead of her as the smoke covered everything around her. She saw burning embers on the left of the freeway, on the right of the freeway and in the median. Hoping she could make it safely, she gripped the steering wheel and guided the car to the high school as the fire blazed on.

Howard Allred had been calling the Utah Department of Transportation all day trying to get the freeway closed. "It is dangerous to drive on it," said a radio dispatcher at 1:13 that morning. "The fire just crossed Black Rock Road and is less than two miles to I-15." Allred had spent a good part of his time trying to relay that message to UDOT.

Allred, who was always professional while on the job, hid his frustration at the department's red tape. The firefighters who worked with him all agreed that he was the best fire warden they'd had. He always thanked them for their help and never asked a firefighter to go into a dangerous situation. To Allred, safety was key, and he knew that if the freeway wasn't closed someone would get hurt.

His constant calls to UDOT seemed to get no results as bomber pilots radioed in that the fire was growing and was getting closer and closer to the freeway. The truth was if he was going to stop it from crossing I-15, he had to do it with or without traffic.

Allred sped toward mile marker 148, the designated meeting place for those who would help him tackle the fire at the freeway. He is a sturdy, barrel-chested cowboy who proudly wears a gold belt buckle he won at a rodeo in 1967. In his younger years, he first became acquainted with taming the beast that is nature. To him chasing fire was just another version of bull riding.

As he drove, he heard a loud boom and metal scraping behind him. The smoke must have caused an accident, he thought. It was not until later that he learned that two people from California riding a motorcycle were hit and killed.

Allred arrived at mile marker 148 to find trucks from Delta and Fillmore as well as the Hogans' truck from Kanosh, which would be deployed to Cove Fort. The younger Hogan, making the drive from Las Vegas in an amazing three hours, found his father at mile marker 148, where they waited for instruction. They would have a total of six engines and 24 people to prevent the fire from jumping the freeway.

The bomber pilot told them they had 30 minutes until the fire hit the freeway and they told him they would be waiting. They were determined to stop the fire in the median once it had jumped the southbound lanes. Now they were each dressed in fire gear and had helmets and hand tools. The anticipation was numbing as they each sat in their trucks, parked 30 yards apart, and waited for the fire to come into the median.

With the freeway still open, traffic was heavy. Some cars even slowed down to wave at the firefighters and honk their horns. Two girls in tank tops got out and took pictures. A man who had previously driven through the fire brought his family back to marvel at it. He should be shot, thought Allred, as he sat with his eyes on the fire waiting for the wind to bring it his way.

Twenty minutes later the sky had turned black, and they could barely see the rush of southbound traffic. Truck drivers, hearing that their counterparts had to abandon loads along the freeway, were anxious to get as far away as possible. They refused to slow down to accommodate the firefighters' work.

While waiting in their trucks, the firefighters rehearsed their parts over and over again. In each truck one would drive, another would hose the fire and the last would stamp out embers with a hand tool. The fire would be as loud as a jet engine when it came and would make communication impossible.

They had waited in silence and then they saw it. The fire swept to the edge of the southbound lane. It would be just moments then. The fire preheated the median and in one gust of wind it had jumped across the freeway into their territory.

The Delta and Fillmore trucks were the first ones on it. Four high-powered hoses struck the fire at its southern and northern ends, ensuring that it didn't spread along the freeway. Streams of water hit the fire's roots as the flame's tips thrashed toward them. Then Allred and the Hogans got out of their vehicles and sprayed down the ground, making sure the fire didn't relight. With cars whizzing past them, they worked around the fire's edges.

Twenty minutes of fighting and they had eliminated the tall flames. The fire wouldn't jump the freeway, it wouldn't spread to the mountains and it wouldn't hit Kanosh.

When the final flame was purged, Allred looked around but could see nothing but traffic. The thick smoke prevented them from seeing anything. Just then he got a call from a dispatcher stating that 30 minutes earlier the easterly wind had pushed the fire over the freeway at Black Rock Road.

After it had jumped the freeway the winds moved south, and the Hogans knew that meant Cove Fort was in danger. They had to fill up their military tanker and head out there.

Hours later, the elder Hogan had exhausted the 2,500-gallon tank at Cove Fort. He knew that soaking the land south of the fort would only buy them time. He had never seen a faster or hotter fire and knew that if it wanted to destroy the fort it could easily do so in minutes.

He slid off the top of the metal tanker and looked again to see if any other fire trucks had decided to follow him and his son from their success at I-15 hours earlier. But he could see no one, not even the volunteers who had been giving tours in the fort hours earlier.

They looked toward the neighboring Chevron station and saw no one. They were alone with an empty tank and no time to fill up. The smoke made it impossible to see anything but more smoke, soot and fire.

Sweat beads ran down his face and he could swear it was the hottest fire he had ever felt. He didn't know what time it was; he imagined it must be well into the evening, but he had no evidence of that.

The intense fire was burning so bright it might have been noon. They had bought the fort an hour of life; it would soon be overwhelmed by the fire's severe power. But then the winds shifted west and as quickly as it had come the fire was gone. It seemed the fort was saved.

They sat on the warm ground and, for the first time in hours, rested. The younger Hogan looked at his dad and laughed.

"Well Dad, we saved the Hinckleys' fort," he said. "How much should we bill?"

Copyright Brigham Young University 1 Jul 2008