who were the granite mountain hotshots
The Granite Mountain Hotshots were an elite wildland firefighting crew from Prescott, Arizona, best known for their courage and for the tragic loss of 19 of their 20 members in the 2013 Yarnell Hill Fire.
Who they were
- The Granite Mountain Hotshots were an interagency Hotshot crew, meaning a highly trained, physically demanding hand-crew that fights wildfires on the ground, often in steep, remote terrain.
- Unusually, they were the first hotshot crew in the United States to be sponsored by a city fire department (Prescott Fire Department), not by a federal agency or state forest service.
- The crew grew out of “Crew 7,” a Type II initial‐attack hand crew created in the early 2000s to do fuels reduction and wildfire response before being upgraded to hotshot status in 2007.
What they did
- Their main work involved cutting fire lines by hand, clearing vegetation, and creating defensible space to slow or stop advancing wildfires across the American West.
- They spent long stretches on assignment—dozens of days per season—working rugged shifts with tools like chainsaws and Pulaskis, often camping in remote fire camps.
- The crew became respected in the wildland community for their work on fuels mitigation projects near Prescott and for multiple national fire assignments.
Yarnell Hill Fire tragedy
- On June 30, 2013, during the Yarnell Hill Fire near Yarnell, Arizona, 19 members of the 20-person crew were overrun by fast-moving fire after winds shifted and cut off their escape routes.
- The temperatures in the fire front were extreme, and despite deploying fire shelters, the crew could not survive the burnover; one firefighter survived because he was positioned separately as a lookout.
- It remains one of the deadliest incidents for firefighters in modern U.S. history and the deadliest day for firefighters since September 11, 2001.
How they are remembered
- The names and stories of the 19 fallen hotshots are preserved through the Granite Mountain Interagency Hotshot Crew Learning and Tribute Center, which shares biographies and history of the crew members.
- Arizona established Granite Mountain Hotshots Memorial State Park, including a trail with plaques for each firefighter and a quiet overlook near the deployment site, as a permanent tribute.
- Their story has influenced wildland fire training, safety discussions, and popular awareness, and is often revisited every June as both a warning and an act of remembrance.
Information gathered from public forums or data available on the internet and portrayed here.