A fire balloon is the suspected cause of a wildfire that started just before midnight Tuesday night on Y-Mountain near Provo, Utah. These dangerous devices that use a small flaming object to inflate and loft a plastic or paper balloon are also called sky lanterns and Chinese lanterns.
Below is an excerpt from an article at ABC 4 Utah, which also has photos of the fire:
A misuse of a Chinese lantern may be to blame for flames spreading along Y-Mountain Tuesday night, officials said.
Crews with Provo Fire Rescue tweeted the fire broke out just before midnight. The Y-Trailhead is closed Wednesday morning as Provo Fire and Forest Service crews mop up the area.
The fire was contained to just a couple of acres, but officials said if needs be a helicopter would perform possible water drops from a helicopter Wednesday morning.
The people who misused the lantern were issued a citation. Officials said the fine starts at $500 but that does not include the cost of fire suppression.
One could argue that any use of a fire balloon is “misuse”. They are illegal in at least 25 states.
This is not the first time one of these things has started fires. Another recent example was in May when a fire balloon ignited a fire in a cell phone tower.
Articles at Wildfire Today tagged “fire balloons”.
We keep hearing that wildfire seasons are becoming longer. One way to verify this for a particular location is by analyzing times of the year that fires occur and the acres burned by date. But researchers have provided more information for the longer fire season discussion by studying weather across planet Earth. They used the data for a 34-year period, from 1979 to 2013, to calculate the U.S. Burning Index, the Canadian Fire Weather Index, and the Australian (or McArthur) Forest Fire Danger Index. They normalized the daily fire danger indices to a common scale and resampled to a common resolution.
What the researchers found was that fire seasons have lengthened across 29.6 million km2 (25.3%) of the Earth’s vegetated surface, resulting in an 18.7% increase in global mean fire season length. They also show a doubling (108.1% increase) of global burnable area affected by long fire seasons.
There were no significant trends in mean annual total precipitation or total precipitation affected area but they did observe a significant increase in mean annual rain-free days, where the mean number of dry days increased by 1.31 days per decade and the global area affected by anomalously dry years significantly increased by 1.6% per decade.
Two people have been ordered to pay $9,450 restitution for starting the Three Mile Fire nine miles east of Florence, Montana in August, 2014 that burned about 50 acres before firefighters extinguished it at a cost estimated at $94,000. Tristan C. Olson, 30, of Missoula and Caitlin E. Hoover, 28, of Stevensville, Montana agreed to the settlement in exchange for the felony charges being dropped. They will also have to follow specific conditions for three years, including abstaining from the consumption of alcohol and drugs or entering bars or casinos.
The fire started when an exploding target was detonated in a tree surrounded by waist-high cured grass.
Two mountain lion cubs that were rescued in the fire. Photo by Cory Rennaker, Bitterroot National Forest Helitack, USFS.
During the initial attack on the fire, Bitterroot National Forest firefighters rescued a pair of mountain lion cubs. The kittens, just a few weeks old, were taking shelter under a burning log. Firefighters called in a helicopter bucket drop to cool the log, and the kittens, wet from the 600 gallons of water, were rescued. They were adopted by the Columbus (Ohio) Zoo and Aquarium, and on September 23 made an appearance on David Letterman’s show along with Jack Hanna.
Exploding targets consist of two ingredients that when mixed by the end user create an explosive when shot by a high-velocity projectile. They have caused many fires since they became more popular in recent years and have been banned in some areas, and caused the death of one person. In June, 2013 a man attending a bachelor-bachelorette party in Minnesota was killed after shrapnel from the device struck him in the abdomen causing his death. The Missoulian reported that two years ago a woman in Ohio had her hand nearly blown off while taking a cellphone video of a man firing at an exploding target placed in a refrigerator about 150 feet away.
241 Fire. CAL FIRE photo by J. Bischof 7-13-2015, via Chief John Hawkins.
A wildfire in Orange County in southern California burned two abandoned structures and 180 acres Monday. The 241 Fire was reported at 10:41 a.m. near Irvine Lake and by mid-afternoon the forward progress had been stopped after an aggressive attack by firefighters on the ground, helicopters, and approximately six air tankers. Helicopters were able to turn around quickly after refilling at the nearby lake.
Click on the Twitter images below to see larger versions.
An MD-87 begins a drop on the 241 Fire. CAL FIRE photo by J. Bischof 7-13-2015, via Chief John Hawkins.An MD-87 finishes a drop on the 241 Fire. CAL FIRE photo by J. Bischof 7-13-2015, via Chief John Hawkins.
On August 8, 2013 Engine 492 from the Medicine Bow-Routt National Forest and Thunder Basin National Grasslands was involved in a rollover accident on Wyoming State Highway 450 southwest of Newcastle, Wyoming. Three firefighters were injured, one seriously.
A study by Dick Mangan of Blackbull Wildfire Services found that between 1990 and 2009 the leading causes of death of wildland firefighters were: 1. aviation accidents; 2. vehicle accidents; 3. heart attacks/medical causes; and 4. burnovers. From 1990 to 2006, 71 firefighters died in vehicle accidents.
This is a very unscientific data set, but since we started Wildfire Today in January, 2008, we have reported 17 rollovers of fire vehicles that resulted in 44 injuries to firefighters working on or responding to a wildland fire. That does not include non-rollover vehicle accidents, rollovers of heavy equipment (of which there were quite a few), or accidents that occurred in Australia and Canada. Articles on Wildfire Today, 28 of them, tagged “rollover”.
One person was injured when this engine rolled over in 2010 on the Bald Angel prescribed fire on the Wallowa Whitman National Forest near La Grande, Oregon.
What can be done to reduce the number of these injuries and fatalities?
Training
The first thing that is always discussed in accident prevention is training. The most difficult factors to deal with in driving a fire engine are the weight, the center of balance (top-heavy), the physical stress of driving long distances or after a 14-hour shift, and the mental stress of driving an emergency vehicle. All of these are difficult, but not impossible, to train for. Some fire agencies have Engine Academies that actually put trainee drivers behind the wheel, which of course can be extremely beneficial. But it is not easy to train a driver how to react in a split second when they are faced with the sudden decision about possibly hitting the brakes, changing direction, neither of the two, or a combination of the two. Operating a top-heavy 12,000 or 26,000-pound vehicle limits your options. A quick flick of the steering wheel can initiate a rollover.
Driver’s qualifications
When I worked for the National Park Service (NPS) the agency had virtually no specific policy or qualification requirements for the drivers of smaller fire engines, such as a Type 6, other than having a standard state driver’s license. Or if they existed, they were not enforced. A person who had been hired off the street having never driven anything larger than an Austin Mini could be placed behind the wheel of a 15,000-pound top-heavy fire engine.
We checked with the NPS today, and spokesperson Christina Boehle told us that their requirements for driving fire vehicles are on pages 6-9 of Chapter 7 in Interagency Standards for Fire and Fire Aviation (Red Book). This publication includes policies for the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), U.S. Forest Service (USFS), U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS), and the National Park Service (NPS) and supplements other manuals the agencies have. The Bureau of Indian Affairs does not participate in the Red Book program.
In addition to holding a state driver’s license, all drivers covered by the Red Book have to take a defensive driving course. And, as required by Department of Transportation regulations, all drivers must obtain a Commercial Driver’s License (CDL) for operating vehicles weighing 26,001 pounds or more.
Other than defensive driving, no specific additional training is required by the Red Book for driving fire equipment, except for the BLM and USFS which require “driver training”. Those two agencies also complete paperwork to document driver qualifications.
The Engine Operator position has been removed from the Wildland Fire Qualification System Guide (310-1), but now it can be found in the Federal Wildland Fire Qualifications Supplement. The training requirements listed in the document for the position vary widely among the five federal land management agencies. The BIA does not even recognize the position, and on the other extreme is the BLM which requires seven training courses, only five of which are directly related to operating an engine. The FWS and the BLM require the Engine Academy or a BLM Engine Operator Course, respectively. There is also a Position Task Book for Engine Operator.
Seat belts
It almost seems too obvious to mention, but wearing seat belts is the one thing that every person in a vehicle can do to reduce injuries or save lives in a vehicle accident. Most federal land management agencies have policies requiring the use of seat belts.
A study by the Association for the Advancement of Automotive Medicine found that in 7.6 percent of fire truck crashes that were reported to the police some of the occupants were not wearing seat belts, and 74 percent of the fatal crashes involved the non-use of seat belts.
Supervisors at all levels need to proactively ensure that firefighters in all types of vehicles, including crew carriers, wear seat belts.
Engineering
You may have seen Austin Dillon’s horrific-looking crash in the July 5, 2015 NASCAR race. His car became airborne at about 180 mph and crashed into the fence, coming to an immediate stop. Then when it appeared to be over and the remains of the car were upside down, an out of control car hit it with force, causing it to spin around several times on its roof.
The car was barely recognizable as a car after the crash. The front one-third and the rear one-third were gone, but the integrity of the driver’s compartment and his seat remained intact. The only object in the interior that came loose was the radio. Mr. Dillon walked away with only a few bruises.
This shows what can be done to prevent injuries in a very serious vehicle crash. It is not practical to harden the cab of a fire engine to the degree seen in NASCAR, but there are steps that can be taken to prevent the roof from collapsing in a rollover, such as was seen when U.S. Forest Service Engine 392 rolled over in Wyoming in 2013 (see photo above).
The wildland fire agencies should fund research conducted by engineers to determine how to prevent the passenger compartments in their fire engines from collapsing in accidents.
Ensure that fire vehicles are not overweight
In the 1990s one federal land management agency was accepting new Type 6 engines from manufacturers that exceeded the Gross Vehicle Weight (GVW) the day they were delivered after being filled with water.
Adding thousands of extra pounds beyond the GVW to an already top-heavy vehicle can make it difficult to control, especially when making an evasive maneuver or a quick stop. The additional weight is also hard on suspension systems and can cause premature failure of various components.
While federal land management agencies have been guilty of overweight fire trucks, some local fire departments have had the same problem. Too many departments take a Ford F-150 or F-250 and add a very heavy tank and pump package, exceeding the manufacturer’s designed GVW.
A study by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health documented some extreme cases, including one where a military surplus tanker designed to carry gasoline was transporting 1,200 gallons of water primarily off road, which put the weight of the loaded vehicle approximately 7,000 pounds over the cross-country weight rating.
Australian fire personnel gather at the airport before departing to assist Canada with their wildfires.
Country Fire Authority members in Australia were among 42 Victorian emergency management personnel who left recently for Canada to help fight the worsening wildfires in British Columbia and Alberta.
They’re part of a 102-strong Australian contingent organized by State Control Centre – Emergency Management Victoria who will spend the next 6 weeks filling specialist leader roles in operations, planning, air attack and incident control.
