The 2026 Goldsmith Awards: How they did it with Hannah Dreier of the New York Times

As wildfires swept through Los Angeles in January 2025, New York Times reporter Hannah Dreier noticed something strange — firefighters were working bare-faced for days on end, while residents were told to wear masks or stay indoors to protect themselves from dangerous air pollutants.

In over 400 interviews, public records requests to eight agencies, an analysis of thousands of pages of individual medical and service records, and the creation of a database tracking every national crew deployment over the past two decades, Dreier discovered the dramatic and lasting consequences that firefighters were facing from fighting wildfires without protection — and that the Forest Service had understood the dangers of smoke for decades but downplayed the risk.

As a result of the reporting, Congress passed a bipartisan law that requires the government pay $450,000 to wildland firefighters who become disabled or die from smoke-related cancers.

The Journalist’s Resource hosted a free hourlong webinar with Dreier, winner of the 2026 Goldsmith Prize for Investigative Reporting. This year’s win marked her third time winning the investigative prize.

This is your chance to hear from Dreier exactly how she did this investigation.