{"id":291,"date":"2025-04-08T15:11:42","date_gmt":"2025-04-08T15:11:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.sewellconsultancy.com\/?p=291"},"modified":"2025-04-14T03:05:21","modified_gmt":"2025-04-14T03:05:21","slug":"opinion-this-fire-hardened-former-hotshot-is-prepping-durango-for-catastrophe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.sewellconsultancy.com\/index.php\/2025\/04\/08\/opinion-this-fire-hardened-former-hotshot-is-prepping-durango-for-catastrophe\/","title":{"rendered":"Opinion: This fire-hardened, former Hotshot is prepping Durango for catastrophe"},"content":{"rendered":"

When La Plata County in southwestern Colorado needed a director of emergency management<\/a> in 2021, they found a winner in Shawna Legarza. An experienced firefighter, her career has spanned battling big fires on the ground to overseeing federal firefighting across several states.<\/p>\n

Now, she\u2019s helping Durango, population 19,000, and others in the county to prepare for the inevitable approach of wildfire<\/a>. During the week of April 20, more than 40 neighborhoods will participate in mock evacuations, responding to an alert as if cataclysmic fire were the real thing. Under Legarza\u2019s leadership, it\u2019s become an annual community event that people look forward to, a time when residents can make sure they\u2019re ready if (or perhaps, when) the real thing happens.<\/p>\n

Many locals can tell you that Legarza knows her stuff. She spent 20 years as one of the elite firefighters know as Hotshots, muscling a 45-pound pack deep into wilderness, digging fire lines and sleeping in the dirt.<\/p>\n

Legarza finished her career with the Forest Service overseeing broad swaths of the nation\u2019s firefighting apparatus. But before Legarza could become a Hotshot, she had to break into a man\u2019s world.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was 1990 and I had this scrap of paper with two job openings,\u201d she recalled, \u201cso I called the first Hotshot superintendent who said flat out: \u201cWe don\u2019t hire women.\u201d Legarza, who would go on to start the San Juan Hotshots crew 12 years later, didn\u2019t give up.<\/p>\n

\u201cI called the next guy on my list and said, ‘Hey, my name is Shawna Legarza and I want to be a Hotshot.’” This time she got the job. \u201cI was super fit and I knew it was my job for life.\u201d<\/p>\n

Still athletic at 55, she ran 13 ultramarathons last year. A co-worker, Emily Spencer, the county\u2019s planning section chief, calls LeGarza \u201ctough as nails.\u201d<\/p>\n

By 2013, Legarza had moved up fast in the Forest Service and was overseeing all federal firefighting in California, Hawaii and the Pacific Islands. \u201cI was year-round firefighting,\u201d she said. What it taught her was that if you\u2019ve planned and you\u2019re ready to act before a wildfire erupts, you can help save people\u2019s lives and their homes.<\/p>\n

The consequences of not being prepared were the most heartbreaking part of firefighting, she said. \u201cThroughout my career I had to dwell on the bad fires, the ones where people panicked. I\u2019ve watched structures built in the trees become torches. I\u2019ve felt the chaos when there were no appropriate roads to escape on or to bring in help.\u201d<\/p>\n

One local wildfire she helped fight was the 2002 Missionary Ridge fire, which burned 76,000 acres near Durango. Buildings were destroyed and mountain ranges once considered fire breaks turned into wildfire bridges.<\/p>\n

Invited to give a talk to the Durango Rotary Club a few years ago about her career, she said the first question from the audience was: \u201c\u2018You\u2019ve had a million jobs! Are you 90 years old?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve worn a lot of hats,\u201d she admitted. As a rural kid growing up in Nevada, she started out as a ranch hand, building fence and collecting manure. A slaughterhouse job earned her $1.50 a day.<\/p>\n

Now, as spring begins with a climate growing drier and warmer, it\u2019s no secret that forests are primed for wildfire. To get residents prepared if wildfires ignite at the edges of Durango, Legarza for the last three years has sponsored a widely popular \u201cevacuation scenario.\u201d There\u2019s even a waiting list to participate.<\/p>\n

Legarza said emergency management is about imagining the future. \u201cAsk yourself, are you prepared? Here\u2019s a start: remove fire fuels around your property, check your insurance, pack your go-kits, know how to evacuate.\u201d<\/p>\n