Dog Bar 1980

On October 7, 1980, at approximately 1445 hours, Heavy Equipment Operator Robert Walton received first and second degree burns to his arms and face when his bulldozer was overrun by fire while constructing fireline on the Dog Bar Fire in the California Department of Forestry's Nevada-Yuba-Placer Ranger Unit. Walton was transported to the Sacramento Burn Center. His right forearm and both elbows were burned by radiant heat through his flame-resistant shirt which was stretched tight while reaching for the fire curtains and shielding his face at the same time. Also, radiant heat burned the back of his ears while getting off the machine to escape the fire on foot. He left the dozer running and in reverse hoping that it would walk out of the fire before burning. It travelled approximately 15-20 feet at which time it lodged between two trees and stopped. Total backup distance from dozer line to the point the dozer lodged against trees was 100 feet. Walton stated that he realized before he left the machine to run on its own, there weren't any crews, vehicles or structures for the dozer to run into.

Burn Injury, Heavy Equipment, Equipment, Initial Attack, Entrapment