Feeling Shame, 12 Wildfire Entrapments, not one Incident Report

I just did my 2024 Safety Audit and had a field visit from the area Forest Safety Council rep. What a valuable exercise but I am feeling shame. My audit results indicate that I have been negligent in my wildfire entrapment reporting.

In recent years my interactions with wildfire have become increasingly prolonged and intense culminating with being in Scotch Creek on the big day in August, 2023. I feel we got very lucky that day but are overdue for a tragedy.

Since 2017 I have been involved with at least 12 wildfire entrapments, five of which were burn-overs. I have not completed or submitted a single incident / close call report or hazard observation. One of them involved myself and 20 equipment operators.

I am not sure my supervisors even know those events occurred.

Inadequate Safe Zone burned over Aug. 2021.

Why I Haven’t Reported

1. Complacency – I am getting used to having very elevated fire behavior all around me. The incidents have gotten progressively more intense but so far, I have made it through unscathed, In the safety world complacency is the unseen potential killer.
2. Personality – Most of us in the response business are at least partially Type A. Anyone with any fire mileage has a raging inferno on their screen saver, profile pic or on the wall in the office with an accompanying epic personal story. Dealing with fire is generally an up-close relationship. I hate walking away and letting a fire do its thing. I chuckle when a crew of keen youngsters gets back to the Safe Zone using words like “Spicey” and “Sporty” to describe a recent situation.
3. Confusion – Wildfire response teams expand and contract based on priorities and available resources. Supervisors are moved around and crews come and go. Supervisors may be from BC Wildfire, other government agencies or industry and often are in positions they are unfamiliar with but are trying their best. In big fire seasons it may be difficult to get any followup to submitted reports. This is understandable but shouldn’t be acceptable.
4. Loyalty – Responders are a team. The stress of responding creates a special bond. My best friends are all folks I met on fires. Fires don’t last forever but I would like those friendships to carry on. Reporting a close call or hazard may put a team-mate/friend on the hot seat and create conflict so I often “let it ride”.
5. Laziness – I will lay out a ribbon line 3000 feet up a 65% slope in blowdown on a 36-degree day no problem but at three p.m. filling out an incident report form seems like an insurmountable task.
6. Production – I tend to resolve issues in the field without paperwork so I can get back to the tasks at hand as quickly as possible. This means any learnings are lost or not as widely distributed.
7. Self-doubt– Within hours of an Entrapment I am second guessing myself. “Was it that close? I have been through worse, be-ing close to fire is part of the job” all run through my head and I just move on to the next task.

Defining an “Entrapment”

For the MacLeod 2025 Safety Plan and in my training, I have defined Wildfire Entrapment as:

“Anytime your planned escape routes are compromised or challenged”.

To try and clarify whether a situation was actually an Entrapment I compare it to Bullying and Harassment. If you feel you are being bullied and/or harassed, you are being bullied and/or harassed. If we are wondering if the event that just occurred was actually an entrapment, we should call it one, report it, and conduct an appropriate investigation.

I added a Burn-over definition as:

“Anytime the fire goes over, or around you, close enough to potentially cause harm”.

I think that is pretty clear.

The Risks and Benefits of Over Reporting

I am going to get buried in reports, I hope.

I have done a substantial amount of work for a local company that years ago really upped their hazard, close call and incident reporting. Early on, submitting a report resulted in a painful and time-consuming process. The company has done a really good job of streamlining the report and review process focusing on results to keep the problem from re-occurring. They even reward people for reporting. The big reward is that the company’s injury rate has dropped well below the industry average and is continuing a downward trend.

The benefits are that events and root causes that contribute to near and actual entrapments will be identified and corrective actions developed to reduce the chance of re-occurrence. Trends and common factors can be identified when those causes are reviewed.

A robust reporting system is a huge component of Due Diligence. I have been in the hot seat for various things in my working life. So far I have never been penalized for making a mistake. I have been penalized for not having a process in place to try and eliminate those errors.

BC Wildfire is doing a better job of reporting and investigating incidents but the results may not be shared with us in industry.

My Plan for 2025

I have made some commitments in the MacLeod Forest Services 2025 Safety Plan.

If I submit an Entrapment Report to my BCWS supervisor and they move on to other fires, or just get too busy to deal with it, I am going to do all of the required follow-ups.

I have subscribed to the BC Forest Safety Council FIRS app and will submit all incident reports, including Entrapment related events, into it to ensure that the events are documented, tracked and any opportunities for improvement shared.

Cheap and easy way to report and track trends.

If the Entrapment and Burn-over had potential for serious injury or death, I will immediately ensure it is reported to Worksafe BC as required by the Worksafe Act.

In my training I have updated and improved the Entrapment Avoidance and Burn-over Survival sections. I will present these updates in all full S100’s, annual reviews and other training. This training includes the importance of incident reporting.

As I said at the beginning I feel we are getting too used to having elevated fire behavior all around us. Let’s treat entrapment like the high risk situation it is. After any entrapment complete an incident report and figure out if there are any cheap lessons to be shared that may help prevent a tragedy.

Doug