Kids & Creatures

We took a family vacation to Mexico in October. Carson and Jack made sure they got up close and personal with some of the local wildlife.

On the scene

Roosevelt firefighters work to put out a fire Wednesday that totally destroyed a home under construction. A propane heater used by a crew hanging Sheetrock in the home is suspected of causing the blaze. Daytime temperatures in Roosevelt have been hovering in the mid to low teens. Photo credit: Me

One of the best articles I've ever written

Published July 10, 2007
Best Feature Story - Utah Press Association 2007 Better Newspaper Contest

Photo credit: Scott G. Winterton, Deseret Morning News

Surviving the blaze on Roberson's ranch

Stephen Ridley was in Farm Creek when a raging wildfire claimed the lives of three men.

By Geoff Liesik

Stephen Ridley knew his longtime friend Roger Roberson would be at his Farm Creek home June 29 despite the advancing wildfire that was raging out of control and decided to go help him evacuate. The Ute Tribe Fish and Wildlife range management officer arrived at Roberson's ranch just as the blaze – now known as the Neola North Fire – was cresting the nearby hills and tried to convince him to leave.

“He didn't want to leave and I didn't want to leave him. I wanted to stay with him,” Ridley said last Tuesday in a voice rendered raspy by the smoke he inhaled. “He was worried about his hay.”

Ridley agreed to help Roberson move an irrigation wheel line into position to protect the freshly mowed hay. That decision to stay could have cost Ridley his life, but Roberson came up one pipe short and sent Ridley to retrieve it from a spot a half-mile away.

As Ridley was leaving, Roberson was joined by 63-year-old George Houston; his son, 43-year-old Tracy Houston; and Tracy's 11-year-old son Duane, all Neola residents. The men had come to buy hay from Roberson, something Ridley himself had done for years.

The fire was still dancing on the hill. It wouldn't stay there long.

Ridley drove his pickup truck the half-mile to the edge of Roberson's property, collected the pipe and was about to return when he noticed Duane Houston run past. The boy had followed his father's command to flee. Then the inferno erupted around Ridley.

“Everything was flying from the wind that hit,” Ridley said. “I ran back to my truck and opened the door. I jumped in and tried to close my door and I couldn't close it. There was a lot of noise; kind of like a roaring noise.”

Ridley threw the truck in reverse, trying to escape. His tires just spun. He was able to engage the four-wheel drive and sped backward a few hundred feet across an open field.

“Everything was just swirling,” the 63-year-old said. “Trees started to burn. They were just like matchsticks – when you light a matchstick – they just started to burn.”

Ridley watched as the grass and willow trees in the fields around him spontaneously ignited. An entire ridge covered in cedar trees burst into flames. Then as quickly as the fire blew through, it began to abate.

Ridley hurried back to the place where he'd last seen Roberson and the Houstons.

“Roger was getting up and I ran up to him,” Ridley said. “He held his hands out to me and got me in a hug. He was burned up and I held him and asked him if he was all right and he said he was all right.”

Roberson told Ridley he wanted to go back to his house, but Ridley convinced the fatally injured man to lie down. Then he turned his attention to the Houstons. Father and son were lying side-by-side a short distance away. The grass was burning around one of the men.

“I ran over there and started patting it down to get it out,” Ridley said. “They were still and I knew that they were gone because they weren't moving.”

Ridley went back to Roberson, whom he said “didn't act like he was in pain” despite being burned over 99 percent of his body. He had to again urge Roberson to lie back and rest. Then he made a futile attempt to locate Duane Houston, who would later be found dirty, but alive by a firefighter.

Ridley next went to his truck, trying to raise anyone on his phone or radio.

“I got on radio and started calling people and there was no response,” he said, noting that he couldn't contact anyone by phone because “everything was busy.” He finally got through to his home in Ridleyville, a short distance from Farm Creek, and told his granddaughter to bring his wife to the phone.

But Katherine Ridley was outside, trying to set up a wheel line to protect her own home. She couldn't hear what her granddaughter was saying and sent her grandson to retrieve the message.

“She said grandpa needs help,” Katherine Ridley recalled her grandson saying when he returned to the field. “He wants you to call for an ambulance. Somebody's been hurt.”

Katherine Ridley called her daughter-in-law, who works for the tribe's forestry department, and told her that her father-in-law was in trouble. Then the couple's son, Bob Ridley, arrived at the home.

An experienced wildland firefighter with the Bureau of Indian Affairs, Bob Ridley had been released from the fire lines by his supervisor to help evacuate his parents. When he heard his father was in trouble he immediately started for the Roberson ranch.

“It was a weird feeling to look up there and know that your father was there,” said Bob Ridley, who called his boss to inform him of the request for an ambulance. The supervisor warned Ridley not to go to the ranch because of the obvious danger, a directive the younger man couldn't follow.

“I told him, 'I can't do that. My father's in there and I don't know if he's alive, if he's dead, if he's burning up. I know he called and is asking for help,'” Bob Ridley said.

Back in Farm Creek, Stephen Ridley had returned to his friend's side. Roberson was alert, according to Ridley, and knew how badly he was hurt. His clothes had been burned off, so Ridley used two jackets he carries in this truck – one that he dipped in a puddle of water – to cover Roberson and tried to comfort him.

Ridley went back to his truck again and finally raised someone on the radio.

“This is an emergency,” Ridley said he told the person on the other end. “Let them know people burned up over there. We need an ambulance.”

Shortly after that call, Bob Ridley made it to the ranch after nearly being forced to turn back by towering walls of flame and thick, choking smoke. The younger man feared what he'd find.

“I noticed my dad was in a field west of the house. He was on his knees,” Bob Ridley said. “I drove straight to where I saw my dad and as I got closer I noticed someone was laying on the ground next to him.”

The man on the ground was Roberson, who recognized his friend's son without prompting.

“I asked Roger how he was doing and he said, 'I'm OK,'” Bob Ridley said. “He was breathing OK, he was talking, he wasn't confused or anything.”

Bob Ridley's arrival was followed by that of his uncle Elliot Ridley, Lloyd Arrowchis, and BIA Police Chief James Beck. The men knew they couldn't get an ambulance into the site, so they loaded Roberson into the back of Beck's Ford Expedition.

Stephen Ridley, despite suffering a deep cut above his left eye, followed the convoy of vehicles out of the death zone in his damaged truck. A window had been shattered in the fire's blast wave and a section of airborne wheel line had struck the vehicle.

Bob Ridley stayed behind. He marked the spot where Roberson and the Houstons had fallen on his handheld GPS unit, and notified his supervisor of his actions. Then he too left the area.

When the rescuers reached ambulance crews, EMTs immediately began treating Roberson, who would eventually be flown to the University of Utah Medical Center's burn unit. An EMT also started quizzing Stephen Ridley about his condition.

“They kept asking me and I kept saying I'm all right,” said Ridley, who signed a medical release. But moments later, when he tried to drink some water, the extent of his exposure to the fire and smoke became evident.

“I started coughing and I started to throw up,” Ridley said. “The EMT said I was throwing up blood.”

Ridley's uvula – the small piece of skin that hangs down in the back of the throat – had been seared and had begun to swell. Ridley's airway was closing off. He was rushed to Uintah Basin Medical Center where he spent the night in the intensive care unit before being released the following morning.

Before he left the hospital though, Ridley learned that Roberson had died in the night. He also received a visit from Roberson's daughter Ruth.

“She said, 'I want to thank you for helping my dad,'” Ridley said. “I will miss Roger. He was my friend.”

I admit that I am powerless...

Welcome to the wonderful world of an editor at a small town newspaper in Utah. My name is Geoff and I'm a journalist. (Hi, Geoff.) I picked the Dan Rather quote that graces the bottom of this blog not because I respect the man, but because what he says is true: I have an addiction to news.

At first it was just a Sunday paper every now and again, but it's now degenerated into a constant need to know what's going on and an overwhelming sense of failure when something happens around here and I don't know about it.

News - and Diet Coke - are my crack. I'm helplessly addicted. There's no hope for me. Save yourselves.

- Journalist Geoff