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The really bad ones always seem to come at night. Santa Barbara, California, city firefighters were resting in their fire sta- tions when the calls started to come in. “Major structure fire . . . all engines report.” This was going to be a big one. A fire had started at an apartment building in a crowded area of downtown Santa Barbara. If firefighters didn’t act soon, it could spread quickly. As they reached the scene of the fire, the commanders quickly looked over the situation. It’s a massive job to tackle a fire of this size. Taking it on takes teamwork, planning, the right equipment, and the hard work of the boots on the ground. Several engines and trucks pulled into position. Firefighters scrambled off their vehicles to start pulling hoses and hooking them up to hydrants. To make matters worse, the weather was getting in their way, even for normally calm and pleasant Santa Barbara. “It was one of those humid nights that kept the smoke down low to the ground so that they could not even see where the fire was,” a fire captain told reporters after the incident was over.

Words to Understand backcountry a wide area of open land behind a range of mountains hot lap a firefighting term that means walking all the way around a burning structure to locate the best place to direct water at flames 7