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Articles written by Lorna Thackeray - The Billings Gazette


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  • Ekalaka firefighter killed in Ariz. blaze

    Lorna Thackeray - The Billings Gazette|Updated Jul 3, 2013

    As soon as he turned 18, Dustin DeFord volunteered for the Carter County Rural Fire Department in Ekalaka, embarking on a career that ended Sunday in an Arizona inferno. DeFord, 24, was a member of a Hotshot fire crew killed battling the Yarnell fire about 80 miles northwest of Phoenix. Eighteen other firefighters died at his side in one of the deadliest wildfires in U.S. history. "He was one of the good ones who ever walked on this earth," Carter County Sheriff Neil Kittelman...