Several years ago, newly retired businessman and semi-professional bike racer, Kurt Kamm moved to Malibu with his wife to settle into retirement. After moving to his new found coastal community, they experienced an incredible fire during a 60-70 m.p.h. wind event. His neighbor’s home was completely destroyed by fire, as was the church on the corner in the area. The fire literally crawled up to his front door. It was around 0400 hours and they had only 10 minutes to evacuate.
A month later, during another windstorm in the next canyon from where they lived, 100 homes were destroyed leaving a $500 million damage claim. Not only does this wreak havoc on personal property, but the lives it impacts along the way.
Soon after the fires, Kurt Kamm was driving home and saw a Los Angeles County Fire Department fire helicopter, a Blackhawk land on the Pepperdine University law. In full gear, several firefighters emerged from the aircraft. Envisioning what it would be to one of those firefighters flying into a firestorm in that type of aircraft, he would soon find out. Eighteen months later with hundreds of hours spent in stations camps and Fire Department training academies, Kurt Kamm would publish his very first Wildland Firefighting novel One Foot in the Black in 2008.
His book was so popular and so right on target describing the life of a Wildland Firefighter, that it has become suggested reading for new recruits. In his book, he also shares how the Fire Department trains and deploys female inmate firefighting crews and their many successes.
The Los Angeles County Fire Department has approximately 2500 firefighters and is well equipped, as well as very proactive in knocking down fires in the County. Central and Southern California’s perfect firestorm has been a combination of brush and trees with a 360-day growing season, a minimal rainfall (five inches in 2012 so far), single digit humidity and periods of strong Santa Ana winds that can top up to 75 m.p.h.!
In 2009, the largest wildland fire in LA County burned for six weeks and consumed 165,000 acres. These big and interagency fires happen on a regular basis in California and other Western States.
He has also published two other books since then, Red Flag Warning in 2010 bout a serial arsonist and Code Blood in 2011, about a Fire Paramedic whom finds a foot of an unidentified victim who has a rare blood type. He goes to search for her identity. Sounds like great books to read. Check out information on this well-renown author at www.kurtkamm.com.
We wish you well with many more sucesses in the near future.
© 2012 The NW Fire Blog
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