Four smokejumpers saw a "dream come true" this week when they jumped for the first time in history onto Santa Cruz Island to contain a small fire.
"We've been talking about it for years, kind of joking around, but it's always been one of those things that we would ask each other, 'What if we jumped to Channel Islands?'" said Greg Fashano, one of the U.S. Forest Service smokejumpers. "I didn't think it would ever happen. It didn't hit me until we left coast, until we were flying over the ocean -- it was pretty neat."
Santa Cruz, about 20 miles off Ventura, is part of Channel Islands National Park. The National Park Service owns part of the island, and the rest is owned by The Nature Conservancy.