By J.P. Antonacci | The Hamilton Spectator
Zak Muise died while trying to help.
The 25-year-old wildland firefighter from Norfolk County in Ontario was killed in a vehicle rollover in July 2023 while battling the Donnie Creek wildfire in northern British Columbia, on record as the largest in the province’s history.
Last month, the B.C. government was fined for workplace safety violations found to have contributed to Muise’s death.
Muise, who grew up in Waterford, was in the midst of his third summer fighting fires, working for a private firefighting contractor and deployed through BC Wildfire Service, the province’s wildfire suppression department.
According to a Sept. 25 report from WorkSafeBC — the agency that regulates workplace safety in British Columbia — Muise and a supervisor were riding in a utility terrain vehicle that “went over a steep embankment.”
Both occupants of the UTV were hurt in the rollover, and Muise died of his injuries while being airlifted by helicopter to the Fort St. John airport some 150 kilometres away.
Neither firefighter was wearing a helmet at the time, WorkSafeBC found, and the passenger was not wearing a seatbelt.
“The passenger-side retention netting had been damaged,” the report found.
“Inadequate supervision, a lack of safe work procedures and training for operating the UTV and a lack of a pre-use inspection of the UTV all contributed to the incident.”
As first reported by CBC News, WorkSafeBC fined the B.C. government $759,368.84 last month in relation to Muise’s death and a separate 2023 incident that saw five firefighters trapped and put at risk during a planned burn due to what the agency found was poor planning, training and communication.
The fine is the maximum penalty the regulator could have imposed in this case, which WorkSafeBC said underscored the seriousness of the violations.
The agency found BC Wildfire Service was negligent in inspecting its vehicles, saying a routine inspection would have likely caught that the safety netting on Muise’s vehicle was defective.
Left to grieve Muise’s death were family and friends in Waterford and his firefighting family in British Columbia, where more than 100 people turned out for a memorial service held in Penticton.
An online fundraiser in Muise’s memory raised more than $20,000 to benefit Camp F.A.C.E.S., a camp for families coping with loss run by the Canadian Critical Incident Stress Foundation.
In a 2023 interview with The Spectator, Muise’s former high school teacher and basketball coach remembered him as someone who “worked hard and tried to help people.”
“That’s the kind of person he was — always thinking of other people,” Derek Rowntree said.
“He was always a super nice kid. A supportive teammate. He was one of those guys that everybody liked.”
Rowntree called Muise’s untimely death “just heartbreaking for everybody that knew him, and for the Waterford community.”
— With files from The Canadian Press
