Down Air Prickly Pear
Incendiary Imbeciles #2
Frontline wildland fire workers usually stay “United” in solidarity for survival when facing danger or “bad deals.” They help each other and enjoy the hardship and hilarity endemic to wildfires.
Blistering deserts, steep, tall mazes draped in tangled, stoic forests, the Gila can be unforgiving. That’s why you’re gotta trust your wildland firefighting partner to support and be there for you.
We were reinforcements to an ongoing blaze on a mesa top. As a naive pilgrim to this territory, I considered myself fortunate because my jump partner stood steadfastly a skookum veteran of the Gila.
Our plane circled the wildfire. The spotter threw several crepe paper streamers at the jumpspot. Streamers determine wind speed and direction. The jumpspot should be the safest open area near the wildfire. Then the spotter slapped jumpers out of the open airplane door. My veteran partner and I stood as the last pair out. By the time we jumped the wind blew stronger and it looked like we’re going to have a hard time propelling our parachutes to the jumpspot on the mesa. We drove our ‘chutes “toggles up” causing the open slots in the parachutes to push out the most air and create the most forward drive. I reckoned my partner ahead of me might barely make the mesa jump spot, but I probably wouldn’t. He would surely help me up if I landed precariously on the mesa edge or in a tree because fellow firefighters don’t forget a comrade in the unforgiving Gila.
Then I sensed that I rose up vertically. The mesa must be diverting some wind upward. Pretty soon I bobbed above our plane that circled the jumpspot. So I tried dumping air while driving towards the spot. Suddenly that up-air turned into down-air. Now I plunged down toward the steep side of the mesa, with seemingly no air to fill my parachute. At the speed I fell, I felt I would be injured when I hit the ground. At best, a sprained ankle or broken leg seemed to await me as I plunged faster and faster. What else could go wrong? Suddenly, I realized I headed into a large patch of prickly pear. Oh, the horrors of the medieval Inquisition’s Iron Maiden!
I landed in the middle of the prickly pear patch and skidded for about 20 feet. The prickly pear eased my rapid fall by cushioning with a wet and spongy landing. My padded kevlar jumpsuit protected me from the thorns. I had the customary bangs and bruises from landing in a rocky area, but the prickly pear saved me in a thorny mother’s embrace!
But now I had to deal with the prickly pears’ cladodes and glochids–its prickly thorns. This became the worst part, trying to get out of my jumpsuit, collect my parachute, and stuff them into my packout bag. However, I felt fortunate because surely my reliable jump partner would show up soon and help me out.
As I gathered my equipment and winced at every thorn's prick, I thought of how this thorn clearing experience could be a bit like Aldo Leopold’s story of “The Good Oak” when he chronicled an oak’s environmental history through each tree ring he cut. Only this became “The Good Prickly Pear” in my Sand County Almanac. The large, fat, turgid cladodes with their big avoidable thorns representing years of abundant rainfall and sweet, life-giving monsoons. The smaller, hurting, obnoxious glochids remained plentiful, painful, and difficult to avoid, probably represented droughts and heatwaves. Global Warming must be bringing more of these.
Because I knew my partner would arrive soon and guide me to the fire, I began climbing up the mesa to meet him. It was a hard climb. Always tugging on rocks and roots. Climbing nearly vertically, while carrying that heavy pack. I made my way up, finally arriving at the mesa’s top.
By that time, the other firefighters had lined the fire and commenced mop-up. I put down my pack, got a tool, and joined in the work.
After a while, I saw my jump partner who said, “Oh yeah. Sorry, man. I forgot all about you.”
