Weather conditions were just right (high temperatures, low relative humidity) for wildfires. Large accumulations of fuel and several years of below normal precipitation caused the fire to burned quickly and within a matter of hours the Dude Fire had become uncontrollable. Before the fire was finally extinguished 10 days later, over 28,480 acres had burned in 2 national forests, 63 homes were destroyed, and six firefighters were killed.
This initial rapid fire spread entrapped eleven firefighters, six of which perished in Walk Moore Canyon and just below Bonita Creek Estates . The fire continued to actively spread for another three days to destroy the historic Zane Grey Cabin and Tonto Creek Fish hatchery. A total of $12 million in losses was incurred on the Dude Fire, which cost approximately $7,500,000 to suppress.
The Dude Fire Disaster inspired Paul Gleason to propose the LCES system (Lookouts, Communication, Escape Routes, Safety Zones), now a minimum safety standard for wildland firefighting. Other lessons learned from this incident that continue to influence fire suppression around the world today include knowledge about plume-dominated fire behavior, improved protocols for incident command transfer, and implementation of refresher training for fire shelter use.
