Young Men & Fire E–pub Download

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SUMMARY ó Young Men & Fire On August 5 1949 a crew of 15 of the US Forest Service's elite airborne firefighters the Smokejumpers stepped into the sky above a remote forest fire in Montana wilderness Less than an hour later all but three were dead or fatally burned in a blowup an explosive 2000 degree firestorm 300 feet deep and 200 feet tall Winner of a 1992 National Book Critic Award Young Men & Fire consumed 14 years of Norman Maclean's life He sifted through grief and controversy in search of the truth about the Mann Gulch tragedy then wrote about it in excruciating detail The sobering story of the worst disaster in the history of the Forest Service also embraces the themes of honor death compassion rebirth and the human spirit. Published 22 years ago Young Men Fire still crackles today Norman MacLean s account of the Mann Gulch fire which claimed the lives of 13 firefighters in 1949 is a powerful piece of narrative journalism But MacLean warps the form fearlessly He practically instructs us how to react and think about the tragedy yanking us up steep canyon walls to ponder the series of easily made mistakes in the tragedy where young men died like suirrelsThe lightning sparked fire was a catastrophic collision of fire clouds and winds in Mann Gulch located between Butte and Great Falls along the upper Missouri River The fire was first spotted by a forest ranger and soon a C 47 was on the way with smokejumpers on board heading to the remote canyon with winds so rough that one smokejumper got sick and did not jump Fifteen smokejumpers parachuted into the fire and joined the forest ranger who had been fighting the fire on his own for hours on the ground MacLean parses these first few decisions carefully and highlights the many ways in which it was unlikely this crew might succeed their youth lack of training and lack of training together To make matters worse their radio was destroyed during the jump its parachute failed to openThe tragedy unspools over a few fast hours flames racing up the steep slopes of the canyon feeding on knee high cheatgrass MacLean does an admirable job of breaking down the series of events but it gets a bit complicated and hard to picture no matter how many times MacLean takes us back to various vantage points to consider and reconsider how the flames won and the men lostThe Mann Gulch fire is infamous for the tragedy but also noted for the escape fire lit by Wagner Dodge who figured out in the high pressure situation that the way to survive was to light his own fire and lay down in the smoking embers in order to hide essentially from the bigger onrushing blaze Dodge urged others to join him but they didn t heed his pleas or didn t understand the strategy given the panic Dodge was one of three survivors The controversy over this moment could others have survived as well remainsMacLean takes on the role of investigator prosecutor and philosopher Young Men Fire is compelling reading precisely because MacLean asserts his point of view and takes us inside his thought process neatly interweaving his personal take with events on the ground and almost insisting that we try and figure out what happened We enter now a different time zone even a different world of time Suddenly comes the world of slow time that accompanies grief and moral bewilderment trying to understand the extinction of those whose love and everlasting presence were never uestioned Al there was to time were the fixty six speeding minutes before the fire picked watches off dead bodies blew them up a hillside ahead of the bodies and froze the watch hands together Ahead now is a world of no explosions no blowups and without a storyteller not many explanationsWhere some writers of narrative non fiction work hard to keep their distance from their subject MacLean purposely weaves himself into the story determined to come to terms with the tragedy in the same way he wrote the novel A River Runs Through It as a way to come to terms with the death of his brotherIn the end MacLean doesn t have all the answers and views the Mann Gulch with a long view The truculent universe he concludes prefers to retain the Mann Gulch fire as one of its secrets left to itself it fades away an unsolved violent incident grieved over by the fewer and fewer still living who are old enough to grieve over fatalities of 1949 Buried Mountain Secrets knee high cheatgrass MacLean does an admirable job of breaking down the series of events but it gets a bit complicated and hard to picture no matter how many times MacLean takes us back to various vantage points to consider and reconsider how the flames won and the men lostThe Mann Gulch fire is infamous for the tragedy but also noted for the escape fire lit by Wagner Dodge who figured out in the high pressure situation that the way to survive was to light his own fire and lay down in the smoking embers in order to hide essentially from the bigger onrushing blaze Dodge urged others to join him but they didn t heed his pleas or didn t understand the strategy given the panic Dodge was one of three survivors The controversy over this moment could others have survived as well remainsMacLean takes on the role of investigator prosecutor and philosopher Young Men Fire is compelling reading precisely because MacLean asserts his point of view and takes us inside his thought process neatly interweaving his personal take with events on the ground and almost insisting that we try and figure out what happened We enter now a different time zone even a different world of time Suddenly comes the world of slow time that accompanies grief and moral bewilderment trying to understand the extinction of those whose love and everlasting presence were never uestioned Al there was to time were the fixty six speeding minutes before the fire picked watches off dead bodies blew them up a hillside ahead of the bodies and froze the watch hands together Ahead now is a world of no explosions no blowups and without a storyteller not many explanationsWhere some writers of narrative non fiction work hard to Buried Mountain Secrets keep their distance from their subject MacLean purposely weaves himself into the story determined to come to terms with the tragedy in the same way he wrote the novel A River Runs Through It as a way to come to terms with the death of his brotherIn the end MacLean doesn t have all the answers and views the Mann Gulch with a long view The truculent universe he concludes prefers to retain the Mann Gulch fire as one of its secrets left to itself it fades away an unsolved violent incident grieved over by the fewer and fewer still living who are old enough to grieve over fatalities of 1949

SUMMARY ó Young Men & Fire T On August 5 1949 a crew of 15 of the US Forest Service's elite airborne firefighters the Smokejumpers stepped into the sky above a remote forest fire in Montana wilderness Less than an hour later all but three were dead or fatally burned in a blowup an explosive 2000 degree firestorm 300 feet deep and 200 feet tall Winner of a 1992 National Book Critic Award Young Men & Fire consumed 14 years of Norman Maclean's life He sifted through grief and controversy in search of the truth about the Mann Gulch tragedy then wrote about it in excruciating detail The sobering story of the worst disaster in the history of the Forest Service also embraces the themes of honor death compassion rebirth and the human spir. Fantastic look at a tragic piece of American history followed up by a comprehensive investigation into why it happened the way it did and how this changed the way wildfires are fought forever

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SUMMARY ó Young Men & Fire On August 5 1949 a crew of 15 of the US Forest Service's elite airborne firefighters the Smokejumpers stepped into the sky above a remote forest fire in Montana wilderness Less than an hour later all but three were dead or fatally burned in a blowup an explosive 2000 degree firestorm 300 feet deep and 200 feet tall Winner of a 1992 National Book Critic Award Young Men & Fire consumed 14 years of Norman Maclean's life He sifted through grief and controversy in search of the truth about the Mann Gulch tragedy then wrote about it in excruciating detail The sobering story of the worst disaster in the history of the Forest Service also embraces the themes of honor death compassion rebirth and the human spiri. A detailed and dramatic insight into the art of fighting bush fires based on one man s dedicated research to understand the deaths of a group of pioneering fire jumpers in one 1949 eventDetailed and harrowing the author s determination to find out how the tragedy happened is as impressive as the sheer guts and bravery of those he depicts