The Monster Reared His Ugly Head - The Story of the Rodeo-Chediski Fire and Fire as a Tool of Nature

The Rodeo Fire was ignited at approximately 4:00 p.m. on June 18, 2002 by a parttime firefighter seeking work. The Chediski fire was started by a lost hiker on June 20th. at approximately 7:00 a.m. Within three days, the two fires burned together and grew to be the most damaging and largest fire in Arizona's history, consuming 468,000 acres and burning 465 homes and six businesses. 4,500 firefighters battled the blaze for almost three weeks before it was contained. A dozen communities were evacuated and 35,000 people were out of their homes for as much as two weeks. Paxon was the national spokesman for the Southwest Incident Management Team that was tasked with battling the blaze and this is the story of the fire, day by day, through his eyes. The book also contains chapters on amassed scientific information on fire behavior, effects of drought, fuel loads, environmental concerns and what lead up to the biggest and most destructive fire in Arizona's history. The final chapters contain ways to reduce fire risk utilizing "Firewise" concepts and predictions for the future in wildland fire for Arizona and much ot the mountain West. There are almost 300 photos of wild fire that one will never see in the media, most taken by firefighters on the firelines, so close so that you can feel the heat.

Paxon was born and raised in West Texas (Lubbock) and graduated Forestry School in Nacogdoches, Texas from Stephen F. Austin State University. He went to his first wildfire in 1969 and spent the next 34 years chasing fire, while working for the U. S. Forest Service in Texas, New Mexico and Colorado. The last 13 years of his career were spent on a National Incident Management Team (one of only 16) that responds to manage large, complex fires all over the nation, when called.