In his pioneering work on the common denominators of fire behavior associated with fatal and near-fatal wildland fires published in 1977, Carl Wilson pointed out that many firefighters were surprised to learn that tragedy and near-miss incidents occurred in fairly light fuels, on small fires or isolated sectors of large fires, and that fire behavior was relatively quiet just before the incident. This is certainly a valid conclusion as the general belief had been that high-intensity crown fires in timber were responsible for entrapping and burning-over firefighters. The focus of this paper is on contrasting several fire behavior characteristics (e.g. forward or head fire rate of spread, fireline intensity, flame depth) between fully-cured grass and conifer forest in relation to wind speed for a fixed set of burning conditions. The results of this comparison coupled with the new knowledge gained from research studies undertaken since the late 1970s, indicate that there is a general need for a readjustment in the emphasis placed on certain aspects of fire behavior in current firefighter safety awareness training.