When the Hawarden fire broke out on a Sunday in July 2024, only 20 firefighters were on duty. The department's overhead staff typically works Monday through Friday.
"Typically, we have a staffing in place [during the weekend] for our operations folks," Chuck Tasker, fire training chief for the Riverside Fire Department, said. "All of our fire engines, our fire trucks and our battalion chiefs, they're all fully staffed."
The magnitude of the fire called for more than the staffing on site – it was a matter of all hands on deck. Tasker was called in on his day off. As soon as he showed up, he knew the fire was different.
"We're so used to being able to get our resources on scene, stopping that forward progress, where we kind of initially planned to do so," Tasker said. "[The Hawarden fire] just had the fuels, the weather, and the topography were all in alignment for this fire to make a big run."
The fire went on to ravage 588 acres while damaging seven structures, destroying six and injuring two civilians, according to Cal Fire. Though far smaller than the devastating Palisades fire in Los Angeles six months later, the Hawarden fire exposed vulnerabilities in Riverside's emergency response. Officials used it as a turning point to make strategic improvements.
On Jan. 7, 2025, the Palisades was hit with a brush fire that ravaged 23,448 acres, destroyed 6,837 residential and commercial structures while damaging 973 other structures, and caused 12 civilian fatalities and three injuries, according to Cal Fire.
Through the lessons of the Hawarden fire, Mayor Patricia Lock Dawson said Riverside became better prepared to avoid events like the fires in Los Angeles.
"In response, we've strengthened coordination, improved early response, expanded defensible space around homes and encouraged our residents to be aware," Lock told the Gazette by email. "We enter this fire season more prepared and more committed than ever to protecting our community."
Any type of large-scale incident like the Hawarden fire gets a full action review, according to Tasker, which consists of a third-party focus group within the fire department. The post-fire report is led by individuals that were not in charge the day of the fire where they identify the strengths and weaknesses of the event.
"Everyone submits their comments and narratives as to what they did and what they saw, what went well, what could have gone better," he added.
Following the after-action review, the Riverside Fire Department implemented several changes:
- Preemptive staffing increases during major fire weather events, activating reserve fire engines and apparatus.
- Greater administrative support during emergencies to bolster incident command.
- Updated alarm protocols: A minimum of three engines and a battalion chief now respond to all incidents.
- Seasonal risk models to tailor response plans throughout the year.
- High-risk response updates, deploying four standard engines, a brush engine, and a battalion chief.
- Department-wide command training focused on large-scale incident coordination.
- Automatic command contact during evacuation scenarios.
"We're effectively getting more resources to the scene quicker, to hopefully keep vegetation fires smaller," Tasker said.
