Haskell Cyn. fire under control after blackening 7,110 acres

HASKELL CANYON FIRE STATISTICS

Total area of burn, 7,110 acres. Duration of burn, 91 hours. Firefighters employed, 320 men. Equipment used, 13 bulldozers, 20 fire engine pumpers, 2 helicopters, 1 “weasel.”

Casualties — six firemen burned, three seriously, one bulldozer destroyed by fire, one U.S. Forestry pump badly damaged. The big Angeles Forest fire of 1949, which blasted vegetation from most of the wild, rugged mountain terrain between Boquet and San Francisquito canyons, was brought under control at 9:30 a.m. Tuesday morning.

Back firing operations on the northeast front, along the Del Sur ridge above Boquet canyon did the trick.

Exhausted, smoke blackened fire fighters, many of them Navy men from Long Beach bases, heaved a sigh of relief as the dramatic and spectacular battle was over.

It had been started by a burning airplane, from which the young pilot leaped to his death on a stony ridge.

It had been whipped around the compass by powerful and capricious winds.

It took place in an area in which there are practically no fire, roads, and very few trails, and in which the brush growth of decades had provided an enormous supply of tinder-dry fuel.

And even as the Angeles Forest fire subsided, the smoke of another, huge fire rose above the Santa Susana ridge to the south, and County forces were rushed to Chatsjvorth, to try and keep a Ventura county blaze, west of the Santausana pass, from moving over the line into Los Angeles territory.

FIRE SOURCE SOUGHT

Perhaps the most dramatic feature of the four day conflagration was the discovery of how it started.

First reports of the fire came at 1:29 p.m. Friday and came simultaneously from the lookouts on Sierra Pelona and Oat Mountain.

The fire simply burst out in a great flame from a spot remote from human habitation or travel in upper Haskell canyon.

Seeking to explain the origin, U.S. Forestry men suspected an airplane accident. On two previous occasions this season, falling’ airplanes have started fires in the Angeles Forest.

The Sheriff Department was asked to make a check of airports in the county, and later in the afternoon learned that a Piper Cub had been missing from the Gardena airport since noon.

START HORSEBACK SEARCH

Acting on this information, Bailey Haskell, whose family gave the canyon its name, and Frank Brawley, Jr. put two riding horses in the former’s truck and drove to the main fire camp which had been established near the Forest border in Haskell canyon. They started at 6 a. m. and a couple of hours later began a search of the now burned over country in which the fire had started.

For two hours they rode the fire blasted ridges and gullies but found nothing. They noticed that a U. S. Forestry helicopter was hovering above them part of the time.

Back at the fire camp Haskell and Brawley learned that the helicopterpilot and U.S. Ranger Leland Berriman had spotted the plane wreckage from the air.

The horsemen returned to the area, and quickly found the blackened metal framework of the plane, upside down but intact, amid the blackened stumps of mountain brush.

PLANE NOT SMASHED

The ground showed that the plane had come down with relatively light impact. The engine had made a slight depression in the earth, and the plane had nosed over on its back, but otherwise the ship was all together in one piece.

They could find no trace of the .pilot. Brawley, who is an amateur photographer of considerable experience, had taken his Ciroflex camera along, and took several shots of the scene.

Discovery of the pilot’s corpse came quickly and was msde by Natch Cordova, as he was coming down ‘another ridge about a quarter mile away from the plane in -a bulldozer. The blade of his machine almost drazed the body.

VICTIM IDENTIFIED

It proved to be that of Lewis M. Chappell, age 21, of 4211 roumain avenue, a student pact at the Gardena airport, with only about.20.. hours. lying experience.

The body was hideously broken and mangled, as though it had fallen to the rocky hillside from a considerable height. It was also fire-blackened, but actually not badly burned.

Apparently no human eye saw the fall of the plane. Lookouts reported a small plane in the vicinity a few moments before, but did not see what happened to it.

The remains were Identified Tuesday at the Hilburn Chapel by the mother and brother of the victim, who took possession of such personal effects as escaped the fire.

A C.A.A. representative who studied the scene gave it as his opinion that Chappell’s plane had caugnt tire in the air, and that Chappel, rather than be cremated alive, had chosen a quicker death oy jumping out. The plane had no parachute.

BODY PACKED OUT

Back at the fire camp. Haskell and Brawley met Bill Bailey who had brought in more riding stock. Bailey, Cy Cooke and Bill Rolls rode in to the spot lashed the remains on a pack horse, and brought them out, where the body was transferred to the Hilburn ambulance and brought to Newhall.

FIRST RUN SOUTHWEST

The fire first appeared earlv Friday afternoon, as a towering column of black smoke arising from a single spot in the mountains northeast of Saugus. Quickly the single smoke column became four columns, and then a solid wall of black, oilv smoke, as the fire front rushed southwest ahead of strong Santa Ana winds from the direction of the Mojave desert.

By nightfall, spectators at the high school football game could see the flaming firelines on the mountainsides, seemingly only a short distance away.

By Saturday morning the burn area covered 1,300 acres

NEXT RUN NORTHWEST

The day also brought a reversal of wind, and now strong southwest winds from the ocean halted the fire lines on the south front, and sent the flames on a terrific run up-canvon to the north and east, threatening uptage colony in middle Boquet.

Fire fighters massed on the Del Sur ridge which forms the west wall of Boquet. Although the fire actuallv slopped over into Boquet canyon at some points, it was prevented from coming down the wall into the big cottege colony in middle Boquet.

Another front of the fire burned off to the north east toward upper San Francisouito Canvon and the City Power and Light installations.

FLARE-UP ON SUNDAY

By Sunday morning the burned area had.grown to 5.700 acres, and seemed to be dving down.

Fire fighters were hopeful that they could get it controlled by mid-morning.

It was not to be. The wind changed direction again, and the fire came back down the east flank of Der Sur and into Course Gold Canyon, where there are a number of houses.

It looked as though everything had broken loose again, and once more a Bikini-like column of dark smoke mushroomed into the bright-sunlit air above the mountains. The front rushed south west to within a mile or so of the Dry Canyon reservoir, and then quite suddenly, seemed to die down.

NAVY MEN BROUGHT IN

In the meantime, reinforced by 135 Navy men from Long Beach, brought up in buses, the Forestry men began to get the fire under control on the north and northwest fronts, critical for upper San Francisquito.

By Monday morning the burn had become 6,700 acres, and the rate oi travel was greatly restricted.

Hopes that control could be established Monday morning proved vain however, and the fire continued to smoulder and back toward Bouquet. Monday night back firing was resorted to above the Boquet fire camp, and that ront placed under control. Small break-outs in Pettinger canyon on the southwest front also were suppressed.

COLD TRAIL ESTABLISHED

Tuesday morning the long hoped and fought for moment arrived when a cold trail was thrown around the whole perimeter of the burn, and control established.

The only structure actually burned was a small shed or cabin in upper Haskell canyon.

The battle against the flames was not only strenuous but highly hazardous. Firemen Robert D. Focte and George McClarty of the San Bernardino Forest and Alfred Tartaglia from San Dimas sustained serious burns and had to be hospitalized. Three other firemen were treated at Newhall Community hospital for lesser burns. Wally Grissell, Red Cross representative, was injured in a fall.

PUMPER FIRE DAMAGED

A big new pumper, the pride of the San Dimas station was caught and badly damaged, and the County lost an H.D.-10 bulldozer.

Besides the U. S. Ranger forces brought to the scene, and the Navy personnel brought up from Long Beach, the County kept two big pumpers and several smaller ones on dutv, and a big crew of Camp Four boys.

The main fire camp was in Haskell canyon, with two others established in Boquet.

The fire fighters were directed by Harrv Gracp. fire officer for the district, with Supervisor Bill Mendenhall standing by for help and advice. Gcrge Gowan of the San Francisco Ranger office also assisted.

ROAD BLOCKS ESTABLISHED

During a considerable part of Saturday and again on Sunday road blocks were established by the C.H.P. and Sheriff Department at the river bridge north of Saugus, and at all entrances to the area. Only residents of the canyons were allowed to pass.

The fire did not quite equal in acreage the Red Rock canyon fire of 1943, which was the last big previous fire in the Forest.

The only on-the-spot photos of the plane and pilot were obtained by Frank Brawley, Jr. The Times bought one view which it featured on page one Sunday morning. The Examiner published a fire picture of an unidentified fireman surrounded by flames.