TWISP, Wash. -- A "hellstorm" of flames apparently enveloped a vehicle that crashed while carrying firefighters battling a blaze in Washington state, killing three of them during an explosive fire season in the arid West.
Four other firefighters were hurt, including one critically, on Wednesday as crews fought raging wildfires advancing on towns in the north-central part of the state. Those fires are some of the many burning uncontrolled throughout the West.
Drought and heat have combined to make this fire season one of the most active in recent years. Nearly 29,000 firefighters are facing some 100 large blazes in states including Idaho, Oregon, Montana, Washington and California.
Thirteen people, including the three in Washington, have died this season battling wildfires, said Jessica Gardetto of the National Interagency Fire Center in Boise, Idaho. She said it was a high number, but she could not immediately compare it with other years.
U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack said, "Our firefighting personnel have been particularly hard hit this year," and called it an "extraordinarily challenging wildfire season."
The blazes have "burned a big hole in our state's heart," Washington Gov. Jay Inslee said Thursday, describing the outbreak as an "unprecedented cataclysm."
"These are three big heroes protecting small towns," the governor said, urging residents to "thank a firefighter."
Authorities gave few details on the crash as they notified family members. Officials did say it was not the accident that killed the victims, but the fire.
The deaths happened in the scenic Methow River valley about 115 miles northeast of Seattle.
"It was a nightmare," Okanogan County Sheriff Frank Rogers said. "Everything was burning."
"The firefighters were engaged in initial attack operations and were involved in a vehicle accident when it is believed that the fire overtook the vehicle," said a statement from Okanogan-Wenatchee National Forest.
It wasn't immediately clear whether the four injured also were involved in the crash.
"It was a hellstorm up here," Rogers told Spokane news station KXLY-TV. "The fire was racing and the winds were blowing in every direction and then it would shift. ... It was tough on them up here."
All the dead were U.S. Forest Service firefighters. The agency identified them as Tom Zbyszewski, 20; Andrew Zajac, 26; and Richard Wheeler, 31. Their hometowns weren't immediately released.
Zbyszewski was a junior at Whitman College in Walla Walla, majoring in physics and active in the school's theater department, the college's president said in a statement. He was fighting a fire near his hometown of Carlton when he died.
Zbyszewski's parents had both fought wildfires for the Forest Service, and his mother, Jennifer, still works for the agency, overseeing trails and campgrounds in Okanogan National Forest. They said he enjoyed the work and he felt it was important to be able to protect the homes of people he knew.
"He only had a week to go and he'd be back in college," his sobbing father, Richard, said in a telephone interview. "I fought fires for years and years and years -- I never even got burned. I wish it was me. I'm an old man."
All three men were from highly specialized crews that go into dangerous areas as fast as they can to examine a scene and report back to commanders on what needs to be done, said Bill Queen, a firefighting spokesman.
Their bodies were removed from the scene Thursday afternoon by a procession of emergency vehicles.
Each man was taken out in an individual ambulance, escorted by more than a dozen fire and police vehicles with lights flashing. Firefighters along the route held their hands and helmets over their hearts.
Twisp Police Chief Paul Budrow said the bodies had been left were they fell Wednesday so investigators could take photographs and map out the scene. A complete investigation is expected to take many weeks.
Of the injured, two are with the state Department of Natural Resources, one is a department contractor, and one is a U.S. Forest Service employee.
One firefighter, Daniel Lyon, 25, of Puyallup, Wash., remained in critical condition Thursday with burns covering 60 percent of his body, said Susan Gregg, spokesman for Harborview Medical Center in Seattle.
"He's got a lot of family by the bedside, and I think that obviously helps and we're hopeful," she said.
Department of Natural Resources spokesman Carrie McCausland declined to release the names of the others.
The news of the deaths came after officials ordered the evacuation of about 1,300 people in the popular outdoor-recreation communities of Twisp and Winthrop and of Conconully, home to about 200 people.
To the south, Angela Seydel, a spokesman for Okanogan Emergency Management, said 4,000 homes in the region had been evacuated.
Information for this article was contributed by Nicholas K. Geranios, Brian Skoloff and Martha Bellisle of The Associated Press.
A Section on 08/21/2015