The recent announcement by Tom Harbor of the U.S. Forest Service that they will consider re-establishing a night-flying program for firefighting helicopters brings to mind last year when we took up the issue here. At that time the topic was being discussed because the San Diego County Board of Supervisors was considering night-flying for their fire helicopters. In July of 2008 Wildfire Today conducted a poll, asking:

“Should helicopters fight fire at night?”

At the close of the poll 231 people had voted. The results were:

Yes: 39.8%

No: 51.9%

Don’t Know: 8.2%