## Facts

- On July 28, 1995, lightning started a wildland fire (the “Point Fire”) on Bureau of Land Management (BLM) land in Idaho, near the Snake River Birds of Prey National Conservation Area.
- BLM’s fire planning for the area called for prompt suppression, and BLM personnel responded.
- David Kerby, a BLM crew chief, served as the incident commander at the fire.
- The Kuna Rural Fire District (Kuna) contacted Kerby and offered help; Kerby said he needed assistance.
- Kuna sent two brush trucks (front-line wildfire vehicles) and one water tender (a water-reservoir vehicle).
- Rookie firefighters William Buttram and Joshua Oliver rode in one brush truck, while more experienced firefighters staffed the other Kuna vehicles.
- Kuna did not tell BLM that Buttram and Oliver were rookies, and neither Kuna nor BLM provided them wildland-fire training; Oliver and Buttram had not previously fought a wildland fire.
- Before the incident, the National Weather Service issued a fire weather watch warning of thunderstorms and high winds.
- About an hour after the Kuna vehicles arrived, the National Weather Service contacted the BLM dispatch office on the BLM radio channel with a red-flag warning: thunderstorms and potential 50-mph winds from the south that could push the fire north.
- Kerby assumed all responding vehicles heard the red-flag warning and did not make sure each vehicle received it.
- Shortly after the warning, the other brush truck needed to refill. Buttram and Oliver followed it but never reached the refill site.
- Others later saw their brush truck driving over a black, burned-out area that firefighters generally regarded as a safe area unless wind-blown dust and ash reduced visibility.
- Winds increased, visibility dropped, and Buttram and Oliver drove past their intended location toward unburned grass and sagebrush on the northern edge of the area.
- The winds revived and pushed the fire north. Buttram and Oliver tried to escape in the brush truck but were overtaken and killed.
- The families of Buttram and Oliver sued the United States under the Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA), alleging negligence by BLM personnel in managing the incident and using mutual-aid resources.

## Issues

1. Whether the FTCA’s discretionary-function exception barred claims based on BLM’s on-scene incident-management acts and omissions, including communication of severe-weather warnings and supervision of mutual-aid resources.
2. Whether BLM breached a duty of reasonable care under Idaho negligence law in its management of the Point Fire incident, and whether any breach was a proximate cause of the firefighters’ deaths.
3. How fault should be allocated under Idaho comparative-fault rules between BLM (the United States) and the Kuna Rural Fire District, whose conduct was also alleged to have caused the deaths.

## Decision

- The court resolved the case after a bench trial and made detailed findings of fact and conclusions of law.
- The court found that both BLM and Kuna were negligent and that their negligence was a proximate cause of the deaths of Buttram and Oliver.
- The court assigned comparative fault as follows: 65% to Kuna and 35% to BLM, making the United States liable under the FTCA for 35% of the recoverable damages.

## Legal Principles

- The FTCA waives sovereign immunity for certain torts committed by federal employees acting within the scope of employment, but the discretionary-function exception can bar claims that challenge protected policy judgment rather than operational conduct.
- Under Idaho negligence law, a plaintiff must show duty, breach, causation (including proximate cause), and damages; multiple actors’ negligence may combine to cause a single harm.
- Idaho comparative-fault rules permit allocation of responsibility among negligent actors, and a defendant’s monetary responsibility generally tracks its percentage of fault.
- In wildfire incident operations, reasonable care may include adequate communication of time-sensitive hazard information and reasonable supervision and use of assisting resources, especially where conditions can change rapidly and responders may lack experience or training.

## Conclusion

Buttram v. United States held the United States liable under the FTCA for a share of wrongful-death damages after two rookie Kuna firefighters died in the Point Fire, where the court found negligent conduct by both BLM incident management and Kuna’s training and deployment decisions, and allocated fault 35% to BLM and 65% to Kuna.


Buttram v. United States, Civil Case No. 96-0324-S-BLW (1999)