The Mann Gulch Fire - Famous Fires on Waymarking.com

The Mann Gulch Fire

At an isolated gulch about three miles south of here on August 5, 1949, 12 smoke jumpers and a forest service employee died when a routine fire unexpectedly turned deadly.The lightening-caused fire was spotted by a Forest Ranger about noon on August 5th. Within hours, fourteen of the Forest Services crack smokejumpers were on the ground in the gulch and moving toward the 55 acre fire. Wind combined with tinder, dry grass and steep terrain in the gulch caused a rare and little understood phenomenon called a "blow up". The result was an inferno that quickly enveloped Mann Gulch. The fire jumped the mouth of the gulch and cut off escape to the Missouri River. The men sought the protection afforded by the ridge line to the north. The raging wall of flame moved faster than the men could climb the steep slope to safety. Realizing they could not outrun the holocaust the crew's foreman set a back-fire to provide a makeshift shelter for the smokejumpers. Tragically, fear drove the men on and no one sought shelter with the foreman, the last words he recalled hearing before being engulfed by the flames were "To hell with this, I'm getting out of here!" Within minutes eleven men lay dead on the hillside, killed by the super-heated sir generated by the fire. Two other smokejumpers died the following day from sever burns. Three men, including the foreman, survived the fire.

This marker is dedicated to the thirteen men who died in the Mann Gulch Fire.

Type of Structure: other Other: Wildfire Fire Date: 08/05/1949 Structure status: Plaque Cause of Fire: Lightening caused the forest fire Documentation of the fire: [Web Link] Construction Date: Not listed

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Date Logged Log User Rating   08/31/2007 ZenPanda visited it

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