Seal Beach Firefighter Honored in Solemn Ceremony

The bodies of two firefighters with Southern California roots who were killed while battling an Arizona wildfire were returned to the Southland Wednesday and placed in hearses during a mostly silent and somber ceremony in Los Alamitos.

The "Memorial Ramp Ceremony," coordinated in part by the California Fire Foundation's Last Alarm Service Team, was held at the Joint Forces Training Base for 21-year-old Seal Beach native Kevin Woyjeck and 30-year-old Christopher MacKenzie. MacKenzie, who was raised in the San Jacinto Valley, graduated from Hemet High School in 2001.

“This ceremony is part of the grieving process,” said Keith Mora, Los Angeles County Fire Department information officer. “Fire departments across the country are a big family and when we've had a tragedy like 19 firefighters die, the best way we know how to support the families and take care of one another is to show our support for the fallen firefighters, to give them the respect that they deserve”.

According to organizers, about 50 government organizations, including the California Highway Patrol, U.S. Forest Service, Seal Beach Police Department, and dozens of city fire departments from San Diego, Los Angeles and Orange Counties attended to pay their respects.

The flag-draped caskets carrying the firefighters were brought to the Los Alamitos Joint Forces Training Base aboard a U.S. Air Force C-130 from Prescott, Ariz. One at a time, their caskets were wheeled from the aircraft to waiting hearses. Relatives and friends gathered around them and placed their hands on the flags - - some leaning over to kiss them.

Two sets of honor guards – one from Los Angeles County Fire and the other from the U.S. Forest Service – stood by the hearses and held firefighter axes.

The Southern California Patriot Guard Riders, a group of veterans that honor members of the military, attended the event on their motorcycles and formed corridors of honor, holding flags high on both sides of the path that the two hearses took off the base.

Robert Mccalla, a Huntington Beach resident, was one of those riders. A former Navy man from the Los Al base, Mccalla said he and the other riders – many of whom also served as police officers or firefighters – consider the two fallen firefighters part of their family.

“We're brothers,” Mccalla said. “This is tragic.”

The hearses were escorted from the base by firefighters en route to mortuaries in preparation for funeral services.

Woyjeck was taken to Forest Lawn in Long Beach. His memorial service is scheduled for 11 a.m. Tuesday, beginning with a service at Christ Cathedral in Garden Grove, followed by interment at Forest Lawn.

MacKenzie was taken to the Miller Jones Mortuary in Hemet, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection. Services for MacKenzie will be held at 6 p.m. Saturday at the Ramona Bowl, 27400 Ramona Bowl Road, Hemet.

The two were among 19 firefighters with the Granite Mountain Interagency Hotshot Crew, an elite wild land firefighting unit, who died near Yarnell, Ariz., June 30 in the worst wild land firefighting loss in the U.S. since the 1933 Griffith Park Fire in Los Angeles, where 29 firefighters were killed.

Two fire trucks from the Orange County Fire Authority flanked the entrance to the base, their ladders extended high to jointly hold a large American flag. Two other fire trucks from Los Angeles County Fire draped another flag over the entrance to the airfield.

Dozens of fire department and emergency service vehicles sat on the tarmac while hundreds of service members and hundreds of residents, friends and family members watched the caskets arrive.

Retired Marine, Lance Cpl. Derek Hendershot, who works with Vision 2 Victory, a veteran assistance group, said he attended to show his support for all the 19 firefighters who had died, especially the two locals and the one firefighter who had been a Marine.

“We go over and we protect the United States as a whole, but they protect our day-to-day lives here at home,” Hendershot said. “They're the ones going into a burning building. They're the ones dealing with crazy people shooting each other. They're the ones who bring the comfort and healing. I mean, who doesn't love a firefighter, right?”

Woyjeck was the son of Los Angeles County Fire Department Capt. Joe Woyjeck. He was a former member of the Los Angeles County Fire Department's Explorer Post 9, and worked with Care Ambulance Service in Southern California.

MacKenzie started his career as a seasonal firefighter with the U.S. Forest Service, and served on the Tahquitz crew in the San Jacinto National Forest. He then served on a helicopter crew for the Bureau of Land Management and the Mill Creek hotshots in the San Bernardino National Forest. He was invited to apply to the Granite Mountain hotshot crew by Aaron Stevens, one of his former captains, and had just started his third season as a full-time employee with the Prescott Fire Department as a lead crewmember, according to Cal Fire.

The California Emergency Management Agency and the state National Guard were also coordinating the ceremony.

A memorial fund for the Woyjeck family has been established at the F&A Federal Credit Union, account number 177222-2625.

Woyjeck is survived by his parents Joe and Anna, his brother Bobby and sister Maddy. 

--City News Service

--John Crandall contributed to this story.