Burned out: Former B.C. wildfire fighters worry safety at risk as experienced workers leave

The Current24:35Wildfire fighters are burning out, right when they’re needed most

One part gasoline, three parts diesel is a common mixture in a drip torch — that steel, spouted can firefighters use to start controlled burns and deprive wildfires of fuel.

B.C. wildfire fighter Dylan Bullock didn’t like the look of his mixture on July 7, 2021 — the day of what the 34-year-old refers to as “the incident.” It was the sort of mishap where fatigue plays a role, something former firefighters fear will increase as people grow weary and leave the B.C. Wildfire Service, as the 10-year veteran Bullock did in 2023.

“I don’t feel good about that,” he told CBC Radio. “But I also know how I felt at the end of last season.”

At a time when B.C. needs wildfire fighters most, the service is struggling to retain experienced workers amid longer and harsher fire seasons. Some who have left say that as seasoned firefighters burn out, newer ones must take their place, increasing the danger to everyone.

‘Oh, maybe I’m not OK’

It had been a tough few days for Bullock. He was working his ninth season with the B.C. Wildfire Service, during the summer of 2021, the deadly heat dome in Western Canada. The town of Lytton — his home base for years — had burned to the ground a little over a week before. The scorching workdays stretched past 12 hours; meaningful breaks were few.

The day of the incident, he was “probably not in the best mental capacity,” but he noticed that whatever was in the drip torch didn’t look right. A crew member later recounted hearing Bullock say it “looked clean.”

Bullock asked a crew member to fetch a new drip torch, and he opened his to dump the bad fuel. But a patch of grass nearby was still burning.

“Boom.”

Bullock’s protective clothing was no match for the blaze.

“I’m now on fire,” he recalled. The radio around his neck was melting.

B.C. wildfire fighter Dylan Bullock holds a drip torch in this undated photo. An incident with a drip torch during the 2021 wildfire season left him with serious injuries. He left the B.C. Wildfire Service after the 2023 season. (Submitted by Dylan Bullock)

Bullock pulled off his shirt, and two crew members helped douse the flames.

“I think I’m OK,” Bullock said. “And I look down and all of my fingertips have these blisters on them. And there’s a massive blister on the front of my chest that looks like somebody taped a water balloon to my chest…. And I can smell burning hair. And then I’m like, ‘Oh, maybe I’m not OK.'”

Bullock was airlifted to a Vancouver hospital and put on life support before he woke up about six days later, disoriented and hallucinating from painkillers. His long recovery included multiple skin grafts.

Investigators concluded the fuel was probably contaminated with water. WorkSafeBC, the provincial agency that promotes safe workplaces, said resources and response workers at the time were “stretched beyond capacity.” 

Despite his ordeal, Bullock wasn’t ready to leave firefighting just yet.

Eager for the fray

Like Bullock, Rose Velisek loved being a firefighter.

“It was just very romantic to me,” said Velisek, who had dreamed of the job since she was 14. She was accepted into the service in 2021 at the age of 20.

“I loved it. I loved how backbreaking it was.”

But by the end of the 2023 fire season — British Columbia’s worst — both Bullock and Velisek had left behind the jobs they had lived for.

Residents watch the McDougall Creek wildfire in West Kelowna, B.C., in August 2023. (Darren Hull/AFP/Getty Images)

Bullock says after initially enjoying his return post-accident, he was soon overcome with the persistent feeling his crew was under-resourced — not enough people, pumps or helicopters.

“I just felt kind of paralyzed.”

He also saw a few close calls, like when a firefighter took a wrong turn directly into the path of a fire. The firefighter ditched his car, fleeing to safety on foot, as the heat melted the side mirror.

Fires turn deadly

Velisek also felt overwhelmed by the enormity of the fires and what her crew had at hand to fight them.

“There was a lot of pressure because there was a lack of resources, a lack of experience…. Can we complete the task we’re given? And are we prepared to?”

(The B.C. government announced a $56-million upgrade to the Ministry of Forest’s air fleet and $16 million for pumps and other equipment after the 2023 season.)

Velisek says fatigue was a major factor in a vehicle collision on the job that left her “frozen and hyperventilating and panicking,” as well as with whiplash and a concussion.

Then came July 13, 2023. Bullock remembers his 20-person crew had just arrived at a hotel in Prince George, when they learned that B.C. wildfire fighter Devyn Gale, 19, had been killed by a falling tree.

“The entire crew was incredibly emotional.”

WATCH | B.C. wildfire fighters remember their sibling killed on duty: 

B.C. wildfire fighters remember their sibling killed on duty

Nolan Gale and Kayln Gale tearfully reflected on their sister Devyn Gale’s life and legacy at a memorial service in Revelstoke, B.C.

For Velisek, the news was chilling. More than once while she was fighting a fire, trees had fallen metres from where she was standing.

In all, eight firefighters died on the job countrywide last year, including six in B.C.

Riel Allain, a former smoke jumper who quit the service after six years in 2022, voiced his concerns in a then-anonymous letter to the executive director at the time about the lack of retention and experience.

“People are getting exhausted,” he told CBC Radio. “And they need to look at this critically — and really quickly, as well, because people are leaving. And we’re hurting.”

Allain also has concerns about the $27-an-hour starting pay, but it’s the inexperience that troubles him most.

“If you don’t have that, you erode the capability of the organization to actually put fires out and keep people safe.”

‘Moral liability’

David Greer, acting executive director of the B.C. Wildfire Service, says he feels the weight of how to keep firefighters safe as seasons get longer and more complicated.

“I think there’s a word for it,” he told CBC Radio recently about the deaths. “I think it’s called moral liability, where everyone felt responsible in some way.”

Greer, who was a wildfire fighter for a decade until 2006, says training and retention is his No. 1 mission. He says he understands the pressure on firefighters, especially as the fire season can now keep them from their families from April to November.

Firefighters with the British Columbia Wildfire Service play rock-paper-scissors to determine assignments while working in the North Shuswap region of British Columbia of B.C. on Aug. 23 last year. (Jesse Winter/Reuters)

Because fatigue is an issue, he says, the service has introduced mental health programs and expanded crew sizes from 20 people to 22.

Greer is also helping develop the programs that will be taught at a new wildfire training centre being established in Kamloops. He hopes that in time, people will be able to earn a bachelor of science in wildfire. Courses could include wildfire weather, community health and advanced technology.

Greer says there is no industry standard for experience that he knows of. The union that represents B.C. wildfire fighters says those with the highest level of training have about three seasons’ worth.

‘I need to get out of here right now’

Velisek, who was with the service for three seasons, is almost apologetic about the incident that ultimately drove her to leave the job.

“Sometimes I don’t feel like it was … a big enough event,” she said.

It was a day when she and three other crew members were using drip torches to burn off fuel in the forest.

“I couldn’t see them,” she said. “I could only hear their voices. And then as the flames behind us started to kick up, I couldn’t hear them walking anymore.” 

In this black and white, undated photo, Velicek uses a drip torch to start a controlled burn while battling a B.C. wildfire. (Ben Westerik)

Velisek, who had burned herself before using a drip torch, became very conscious of it in her right hand.

“If I step wrongly, it’s so thick in here, I’m going to light myself on fire again. No one’s going to hear me. What if I’m ahead of them and I cut them off with my flame because the trees are just taking off in no time at all?”

She screamed for someone to take her drip torch.

“I need to get out of here right now,” she remembers thinking. “I just, I can’t do this. I was a blubbering ball for about half an hour. I couldn’t take in my surroundings. I couldn’t take in what was happening.

“Just traumatized, I guess.” 

The next day, Velisek left the B.C. Wildfire Service.

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