The National Wildfire Coordinating Group’s Equipment Technology Committee has issued an advisory about fire shelters. Actual use on fire entrapments confirmed by testing shows that shelters manufactured before 2006 “function as intended” but may experience greater delamination between the silica cloth and aluminum foil when deployed.
The U.S. Forest Service National Technology and Development Program detected differing levels of fire shelter degradation during two separate entrapments in 2020 where fire shelters were used. Further investigation revealed that those manufactured prior to 2006 showed more degradation.
The NWCG advisory does not describe how serious the delamination is, or the differences in temperature and effects on a person inside who is hoping the device will save their life. Nor does it take the obvious step of recommending any actions that should be taken or not taken, such as discontinuing use of the pre-2006 models. It only says the advisory “provides technical information to support agency-specific decision-making regarding replacement of fire shelters manufactured prior to 2006.” The fact that they issued the advisory, and surrounded the document with yellow and gray slashes (see below), promotes the assumption that it is an urgent concern.
The failure to take a stand on this important safety issue could be because the agencies do not want to be forced to spend the money to buy new shelters. They are listed in the 2019 Federal Defence Logistics Agency Wildland Fire Equipment catalog starting at $326 for the regular size — without the case. Purchased on the open market the costs are considerably higher. I found prices ranging from $441 to $595.
The advisory is below. Click the arrow at the bottom-left to see the photos on the second page.
[pdf-embedder url=”https://wildfiretoday.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/Fire-Shelter-Advisory-3-16-2022.pdf” title=”Fire Shelter Advisory 3-16-2022″]
Average cost to outfit one forestry tech acting as wildland firefighter with subpar PPE (FSS) just under 4000$. However, this number can easily double if specialized equipment is required such as a flight helmet 2000$, side impact felling ops helmet 700$, just as examples. Many districts with FS report lack of or inadequate PPE funding. This will add to an already grim situation without baseline PPE and expanded PPE funding being made very accessible to individuals with fire quals. Now local budgets that are nonexistent will have to pick up the 300$ tab for replacement shelters. On our unit this is 6000$ alone to replace shelters. Funding for cache/engine/crew was 0$ in 2021 and word is that will be 0$ in 2022. Any ideas?
I Retired four years ago after 25yrs I have to say I took out my fire shelter out of the plastic case and put in food and extra tobacco. Did the same in the military took out what I didn’t need and put in extra ammo.
NWCG is hanging by a thread without revisiting and recommitting by all agencies to the 1976 compact – if that means revising and recommitting then excellent. What will not stand is the current state of toothless existence that NWCG has become. Forest service does its own thing for xyz training and certification while DOI does another. To those that are on NWCG boards: forestry and range technicians acting as firefighters demand your attention and action to remedy the decay of three decades.