Texas couple leads Grand Canyon campground evacuation in wildfire response

GRAND CANYON NATIONAL PARK – A couple from Fort Worth volunteering as campground hosts at Grand Canyon National Park were forced to evacuate their guests as the first assignment on the job. 

Grand Canyon wildfire evacuation

Becky Johnson and Dave Russell decided to volunteer with the National Park Service as campground hosts, freely giving their time at the Grand Canyon as points of contact for a campground on the North Rim. 

The typical assignments given to volunteers in this position include maintaining sites, answering campers’ questions, checking in with guests, and enforcing burn bans in effect. 

Within the first day at their post, however, the couple was given a life-or-death task. 

What they’re saying:

“Our first day as volunteer hosts, our assignment was to evacuate the campground,” Dave said. “And then our second day as volunteer hosts, we had to evacuate ourselves.”

When the park issued the first evacuation order, the fear was that the fire was moving to a position that would block traffic from leaving the park. The second order, which included the Texas hosts, a separate fire threatened to burn the campground. Ultimately, Dave said, the grounds did burn. 

The couple had been interested in working with the NPS for some time. In fact, Becky worked as an environmental professor at Texas Christian University for several years, and said she was delighted to receive a post like the North Rim as her first assignment with Dave. 

When the evacuation order was given, the couple said many of their campers had already set up their sites and left the grounds to watch the sunset at the rim. Due to spotty service within the park, they had difficulty reaching some of the guests, and several campers who returned after dark were faced with a blind pack-and-evacuate situation. 

The backstory:

A large fire, named Dragon Bravo, had started in the park on the Fourth of July. At the time of their assignment, Dave and Becky were aware of the fire, but they say it was being treated as a “what if” situation rather than an imminent threat of evacuation. 

What’s next:

The wildfire situation is ongoing at the Grand Canyon, but Becky and Dave say they are safe at their current post.