Rocky Canyon Fire Fatality 1931

On August 28, 1931, Thomas Gregerson, a firefighter employed to help suppress a large fire near Atascadero, California for the U.S. Forest Service's Santa Barbara National Forest (now the Los Padres National Forest), perished from burn injuries. It is believed Gregerson suffered a medical emergency that was related either to smoke exposure or exertion. Early that morning, he was a short distance from other firefighters--who did not notice him collapse. Laying unconscious in short grass, the firefighter's clothes caught fire.

Discovered semiconscious and very badly burned, Gregerson was transported to the hospital in Atascadero where he died a few hours later. The Forest Supervisor of the Santa Barbara National Forest reported that the fire that killed Gregerson was lit by a private landowner as a backfire to protect their property from the main fire, which was actually mostly contained at the time of the accident. 

Medical or Exertion or Heat, Fatality, Burn Injury, Hand Crews