Jim and Penny head off to the airstrip on fire duty.
"If any drinking occurs, you're not allowed to participate in active fire duty.
I've been on fire duty at pretty much all the western states.
Because the fire emergency is at the highest level, up to 5,000 military personnel have been assigned to fire duty.
He noted that in June and July, which are generally quiet months for fire duty, there had been 73 structural fires in the six neighborhoods where the closings occurred, and that only 16 were serious, but with no fatalities.
"With some of the inmate crews, we get an extra security briefing, and the women are supposed to walk around in pairs," said John Cataldo, 28, a ranger in Alaska's Denali National Park who is on temporary fire duty in Idaho.
Despite the tough line, Commissioner Scoppetta hastened to point out that the department was not suspending these 20 firefighters from work, but merely placing them in companies where they would be less likely to see fire duty as often, and, as a result, be less likely to be injured.
Though inmates have walked away from the fire camps, there have been no incidents of violence involving those prisoners while on fire duty, Callison said.
In response, Beard said the department is considering allowing inmates to transfer to fire duty with as many as seven years remaining on their prison sentences.
The initiative reduces penalties for drug possession and other nonviolent crimes — something that could deplete the pool of jail inmates who qualify for fire duty.
