Editor's Note: This is part 2 of a series of articles on actions that led up to and took place after the fatal plane crash that took four lives on May 23, 2014.
By Mary Alice Murphy
The immediate aftermath of the crash that took the lives of three Aldo Leopold Charter School students and the pilot of a private plane was one of confusion and anguish.
The three students, Ella Jaz Kirk, 14, Ella Myers, 16, and Michael Mahl, 16, were members of the eco-monitoring team, and were finishing up their required work for the YCC grant program that Friday. Aldo Leopold High School teacher Steve Blake taught the class.
Earlier in May, the students had set up transects to study the soil, forest and watershed health of the Gila National Forest near Signal Peak. On Mother's Day, a fire began on the road to Signal Peak and spread over more than 5,000 acres. The students wanted to visit the transects they had installed to see the effects of the fire on their studies, but no one, even after the fire was contained, was allowed into the area, other than official Forest Service personnel.
Blake, at some point, had suggested that perhaps a flight could be arranged. Ella Myers' specialty was forest health, so Blake drove her to the Forest Service to see if a flight could be arranged on a Forest Service plane. The request was deniedG