Yarnell fire: New account of hotshot deaths

• Granite Mountain Hotshot Brendan McDonough purportedly disclosed new information about the fire.
• McDonough puportedly overheard radio transmissions about the crew's last movements%2C city officials say.
• Widow of hotshot boss Eric Marsh says he %22made the best decisions with the information that he had at the time and I believe that to be true because I know him.%22

More than a year after 19 firefighters perished in the Yarnell Hill blaze, the crew's lone survivor purportedly made a shocking revelation: Granite Mountain Hotshots were ordered to leave their safe zone during a radio call between their supervisor and his chief deputy.

Prescott City Attorney Jon Paladini says lookout Brendan McDonough, who barely escaped the firestorm, divulged his secret last fall in a conversation with Darrell Willis, former chief of wildland fires for the city.

When Willis reported the conversation to Paladini and others, it set off a chain reaction of legal actions beginning with reports to the Arizona State Forestry Division, the Prescott City Council and the Arizona Attorney General's Office. It also led authorities to interview other potential witnesses, and prompted an unsuccessful effort to subpoena McDonough.

Asked to comment this week, McDonough told The Arizona Republic, "I think you're being misinformed."

Willis, when contacted by the newspaper, confirmed that McDonough approached him about seven months ago with new information on the tragedy that was not disclosed during two investigations. But he disputed key details in Paladini's account.

If the events described by Paladini occurred, they help answer a lingering question about the tragedy.

They also could dramatically influence a wrongful-death lawsuit filed by some of the hotshots' surviving family members, and workplace-safety litigation against the Arizona State Forestry Division for allegedly negligent supervision of wildfire-suppression efforts. An Arizona Division of Occupational Safety and Health investigation led the state Industrial Commission to issue $559,000 in fines, which are under appeal.

The Yarnell Hill Fire burned 8,000 acres, destroyed 114 structures and forced hundreds of residents to flee for their lives. The Granite Mountain crew's decision to leave a safe area as winds whipped the blaze into a firestorm confounded wildfire experts and has remained a mystery despite two investigations.

Previously disclosed videos and testimony indicated that Eric Marsh — the crew's supervisor who was separated from the others to scout the fire — and Jesse Steed — Marsh's top deputy who was in charge of the crew — had a radio discussion on the afternoon of June 30, 2013, shortly before the hotshots were overcome by flames.

A thunderhead swirled over Yarnell and the firestorm reversed direction. Marsh had descended from a ridge to the safety of a ranch compound in Glen Ilah. As flames raced in, McDonough executed a preplanned escape from his lookout post and joined several members of the Blue Ridge Hotshots.

Paladini offered the following account of McDonough's story, as he says was related to him by Willis, who disagrees:

While moving vehicles with the Blue Ridge crew, McDonough allegedly overheard radio traffic between Marsh and Steed, who was with 17 crew members atop a ridge that had burned days earlier.

In the radio call, Marsh told Steed to leave the "black," which was safe, and join him at the ranch. Steed protested, saying such a move would be dangerous. The radio exchange turned into a dispute.

"My understanding of the argument between Eric Marsh and Jesse Steed … was that Steed did not want to go down," Paladini said.

According to Paladini's account, Steed objected until Marsh gave him a direct order to descend.

As the back-and-forth conversation continued, it became apparent that Steed, a U.S. Marine veteran, consented to the command to relocate the team. But he told Marsh he thought it was a bad idea.

During one of the final radio transmissions, according to the account, Steed told Marsh the crew was not going to make it.

"That is what Darrell (Willis) told me," Paladini said.

At some point, as a wall of flame moved in, Marsh joined the hotshots and became trapped with them several hundred yards from the ranch house. Crew members tried to dig in and cover up with protective blankets, but all were killed.

McDonough declined to discuss the controversy in detail when contacted by The Republic.

"I'm just not doing anything within the media ... involving around any of that kind of stuff," he added.

Amanda Marsh, the Granite Mountain supervisor's widow, said Friday that if there was not a recording of the entire conversation, then it is hearsay.

"It's just 'he said, she said.' ... Until somebody can prove something happened, until somebody can prove it, there is no reason for me to get worked up about it. It's not real."

Marsh said McDonough has never talked to her about what he might have heard on the radio.

"Until Brendan comes to me and talks to me about it and tells me that something happened ..." she said. "There was so much happening. So much going on in those moments, so much adrenaline ... It's very easy to Monday-morning quarterback all of these things that happened. The bottom line is, they are never coming home. They are just not coming home.

"For me, Eric is in my heart and he is a brave and courageous human being. He made the best decisions with the information that he had at the time and I believe that to be true because I know him," she said.

McDonough had been interviewed extensively during two Yarnell Hill Fire investigations. Official reports contain no indication that he described a radio dispute between Granite Mountain's leaders over the critical decision to relocate.

McDonough, who no longer works for the city, has obtained private legal counsel, David Shapiro. McDonough so far has not been deposed in legal cases stemming from the accident.

Members of the Blue Ridge Hotshot crew, according to Paladini's account, overheard the radio conversation with McDonough. They have provided statements in the past for official inquiries, but records do not describe the conversation in question.

The U.S. Forest Service refused to allow them to give sworn testimony for a workplace-safety probe by the Arizona Division of Occupational Safety and Health. The Blue Ridge firefighters were interviewed for a Serious Accident Investigation, conducted on behalf of the Forestry Division, but their statements were not recorded and only summaries were released to the public.

Asked by phone this week to comment on McDonough's purported revelations, Blue Ridge Superintendent Brian Frisby said, "We're going to decline."

Willis declined to verify Paladini's version of the critical radio conversation, and said he never quoted McDonough as saying that the crew was ordered off the ridge by Marsh. "That was not part of the detail that I knew — that he told me."

However, he also said McDonough's revelations were so shocking, "I told him at that point it couldn't just sit with me. I had to go further."

Willis told The Republic he has a close relationship with McDonough and has been a sounding board since the Yarnell Hill tragedy. He said McDonough called him late last year and "wanted to get something off his shoulders. He did."

Willis said McDonough's account was vague and inconsistent. He said he did not want to violate a confidence, and gave McDonough a weekend to publicly reveal the information. When that failed, Willis said, he contacted Paladini and then-state Forester Scott Hunt.

Willis and Paladini later met with lawyers from the state Attorney General's Office, Forestry and ADOSH, urging them to get a sworn statement from McDonough. "I felt that it was more important for them to know and for them to talk to him because all of it was coming from me as hearsay," Willis explained.

Attorney General's Office investigators sought to corroborate the account by interviewing others with whom McDonough may have shared confidences, including Sharon Knutson-Felix, executive director of the 100 Club of Arizona, a non-profit that helps to raise money for the families of first responders killed or injured on the job.

Knutson-Felix said McDonough came to her last year because he was upset, but she advised investigators there was no discussion of radio transmissions and she could not recall specifics. "Brendan expressed concerns about talking to someone because he needed to talk," she said. "I believe Brendan wants to tell the truth, whatever the truth is. He should have the freedom to tell the truth."

Although McDonough's purported disclosure to Willis occurred in the fall, it had not surfaced publicly until now.

Documents in the workplace-safety litigation reveal a fierce, behind-the-scenes fight over efforts to obtain or prevent McDonough's testimony. They also indicate legal ramifications could be huge if Marsh overruled safety concerns by Steed and issued an order that brought the crew into the fire's path. The Forestry Division's liability might be reduced in the wrongful-death case, and in a separate lawsuit filed by dozens of Yarnell residents over property losses. The revelation also could affect Forestry's defense against workplace violations and fines issued by the state Industrial Commission.

Attorneys in those cases have been working to achieve a resolution that would satisfy all parties.

In late 2014, attorneys for ADOSH attempted to delay a deposition of McDonough that had been set for Nov. 26. In case filings, David Selden, a lawyer for the Division of Forestry, accused ADOSH of trying to conceal the truth about what happened in Yarnell.

Selden's letter says McDonough, with Paladini as his communications liaison, agreed to be deposed because he "wants to get off his chest the burden of additional information that was not elicited during his previous interviews." Selden argued that McDonough's recollections may be critical to understanding why Granite Mountain Hotshots abandoned a safe zone.

"The radio communications of the crew during that fateful, tragic decision are potentially of enormous significance in this case," Selden wrote. "One would think that ADOSH would leap at the chance to obtain this information as soon as possible, not try to delay and suppress it until later."

Selden warned that delaying the deposition might harm surviving family members because versions of McDonough's revelation would leak and be distorted. "This is a matter of extreme sensitivity. It should not become a subject of speculation, rumor, grapevine communications and second-, third-, or fourth-hand hearsay."

McDonough was not deposed in November. In a subsequent letter to Administrative Law Judge Michael Mosesso, Selden requested a subpoena ordering McDonough's testimony on Feb. 26.

Mosesso refused to issue a subpoena, records show, and McDonough was not deposed in February.

Officials at ADOSH, the Division of Forestry and the Attorney General's Office declined comment.

Paladini divulged his knowledge of the controversy after being contacted by The Republic. "At some point, the whole truth — the whole story — has to come out," he said. "From the beginning, there has always been the question of why they left the black. ... The question on why may go on unanswered forever."

Paladini stood by his account when told that Willis challenged it.

Prescott City Councilwoman Jean Wilcox, a lawyer, said the council was notified by the city attorney last year of purported key revelations about the crew's movements.

"I think it shows there was, in hindsight, errors in judgment," Wilcox said, adding: "only in hindsight."

She also expressed compassion for the crew's lone survivor: "He needed to talk to people he knew. One of those people was his supervisor (Willis)," she said. "We all care about McDonough as a person and sympathize with him."

Republic reporter Richard Ruelas contributed to this article.