At a Wildfire With a Notebook — and a Mask

I was wearing an N95 mask, but the firefighters around me were barefaced. One joked that they were all going to get cancer some day. Another teased his crewmate that he was a bad-luck charm because they always got “tear-gassed” while working together.

I recognized the same fatalism I’d heard from Joel and his friends.

Now, though, this way of thinking may be starting to change. After our articles were published, the Forest Service came under pressure from Congress to better protect firefighters.