© 2024
NPR for Northern Colorado
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations
KUNC is among the founding partners of the Mountain West News Bureau, a collaboration of public media stations that serve the Western states of Colorado, Idaho, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming.

Two Firefighters Die In Plane Crash While Surveying Arizona Wildfire

 Two veteran firefighters died in a plane crash Saturday while surveying the Cedar Basin fire in northwest Arizona.
Garcia, Dolores A
/
Bureau of Land Management
Two veteran firefighters died in a plane crash Saturday while surveying the Cedar Basin fire in northwest Arizona.

News Brief

Severe weather may have played a role in the deaths of two veteran firefighters in a plane crash in northwest Arizona over the weekend.

Fire pilot Matt Miller, 48, and air tactical group supervisor Jeff Piechura, 62, were surveying a new wildfire near the small town of Wikieup, Ariz. on Saturday when the accident happened.

“There were storms in the area,” Bureau of Land Management spokeswoman Dolores Garcia said. “That’s one of the factors investigators will be looking through when trying to determine what happened.”

Three federal agencies are investigating the plane crash. Both men onboard were experienced firefighters – Miller had spent about two decades working as a pilot and Piechura had a long career in both state and federal fire services. He had worked as a fire chief in both California and Arizona and, in 2005, won Fire Chief of the Year. He was also a past president of the Arizona Fire Chiefs Association.

These were the second and third wildland firefighter fatalities so far this year. In June, a smokejumper died from injuries sustained while parachuting into a fire in New Mexico.

“These tragedies hit us at the most intimate levels,” Garcia says. “The wildland fire community is a close-knit community.”

Record-breaking heat and high winds across the West are fueling one of the most severe – and earliest – wildfire seasons in a decade.

This story was produced by the Mountain West News Bureau, a collaboration between Wyoming Public Media, Boise State Public Radio in Idaho, Nevada Public Radio and KUNR in Nevada, the O'Connor Center for the Rocky Mountain West in Montana, KUNC in Colorado, KUNM in New Mexico, with support from affiliate stations across the region. Funding for the Mountain West News Bureau is provided in part by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

Copyright 2021 Boise State Public Radio News. To see more, visit Boise State Public Radio News.

Nate Hegyi is a reporter with the Mountain West News Bureau based at Yellowstone Public Radio.