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03.15.2015
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OSO MUDSLIDE
Stepping up when the earth fell down
Nature’s mystery or man’s mistake? Courts will decide where the burden for disaster lies By Scott North Herald Writer
12, 24. Children, wives, husbands, grandparents, entire families gone. No one wanted the young chief’s job in those days. “It’s pressure cooker stuff,” he said. Hots, 39, would have felt more at home with searchers. He’s been a firefighter since his teens. He is a pilot with the county Helicopter Rescue Team. He stepped up because the families of the missing were watching, waiting for word. He stepped up because Oso Fire Chief Willy Harper was taking care
OSO — Nearly a year after the worst disaster in modern Snohomish County history, a legal battle continues to take shape over whether somebody should be held responsible. Was the March 22, 2014, mudslide near Oso a tragic display of natural forces reshaping the land, or a calamity caused by human hands? Did local governments have a duty to discourage people from making their homes along the banks of the North Fork Stillaguamish River beneath a slide-prone hill, a place where 43 people later lost their lives? So far, four lawsuits have been brought in King County Superior Court by those who lost family and homes. Three of the cases, representing the bulk of the plaintiffs, have been consolidated for a single trial, now scheduled for October. Defendants include Snohomish County, the state of Washington and Grandy Lake Forest Associates, LLC. The Skagit County-based timber company not only owned part of the hill that fell but also engaged in limited logging there years before. Seattle attorneys Corrie Yackulic and John Phillips represent the largest bloc of families.
See VOICE, Page A8
See LAWSUITS, Page A9
GENNA MARTIN / THE HERALD
Travis Hots, 39, is the fire chief at Snohomish County Fire Districts 21 and 22. Hots set up the incident command on the west side of the Oso mudslide on day one and briefed media during the first week.
In days full of chaos and despair, he was a trusted, steady voice
G
ETCHELL — His wife and two kids would be watching. The families of the missing would be, too. Travis Hots thought of them each time he stepped in front of reporters and cameras in the days after a mountain of mud crashed down on a neighborhood. The Oso mudslide took 43 lives. Hots, a rural fire chief who grew up in Marysville, was for a time the face and voice of the tragedy. He briefed reporters twice a day for nearly a week. He tried to put the unimaginable into words and reassure
By Diana Hefley and Rikki King Herald Writers
families that searchers were doing everything they could. Worry filled his voice, even as he held out hope for survivors. The world saw the exhaustion settle under his eyes and on his shoulders as the days stretched on with no signs of life in the mud. He fielded relentless questions. How many were missing? Could anyone survive? What did it look like out there? A somber Hots delivered the numbers — 8,
HERALD HEALTH
WINGING IT?
REVIVE STOP
Special tips and resources for a healthier family. Good Life, D1
Debating a proposed crackdown on Boeing tax breaks. Viewpoints, B9
Free coffee flows for weary drivers at I-5 rest stop. Local, B1
Refreshing 51/44, C10
SUNDAY
VOL. 115, NO. 33 © 2015 THE DAILY HERALD CO.
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