Taylor Creek-Klondike Fires, Rogue Siskiyou NF, Oregon, August 11, 2018 by Kari Greer.
Celeste Prescott, Instructor and Project Manager for the Fire and Emergency Management program at Clackamas Community College near Portland, Oregon, sent us information about a new Emergency Management Professional program at the college. Registration for the first term closes December 15, 2021.
Clackamas Community College (CCC) is launching a new Emergency Management Professional (EMP), Associates of Applied Science (AAS), degree program. The first term starts January 3, 2022 and is being offered entirely online!
CCC is aiming to help make this degree attainable for anyone interested in helping build a culture of preparedness and ready communities for catastrophic disasters. The program allows for students to take the full course load each term, or one class at a time. In addition, students can apply for up to 22 credits towards the degree for previously completed and approved wildland fire or FEMA courses.
This degree program is being taught by highly qualified instructors who continue to be engaged in different facets of incident management, and it’s being offered at the low cost of $111 per credit hour. The program is designed to provide meaningful learning opportunities for current emergency management professionals as well as foundational skills for those just getting started.
CCC originally began teaching Emergency Management courses in 1996 and began offering Wildland Fire and Incident Command System (ICS) courses in 2006. Over the years the instructors have honed their skills in the classroom, while continuing to work in and grow their experience and knowledge in their respective fields of expertise.
The first term course offerings and details are listed below. Please follow the link at the end for additional information.
Registration for the first term closes on Dec 15, 2021.
EMP Winter Term Offerings | January 3 – March 19, 2022
EMP-201 Introduction to Homeland Security and Emergency Management 4 credits
This course introduces Homeland Security and Emergency Management (HSEM) as a profession. The course begins with the historical context of HSEM and provides a foundation for the many disciplines within the field including threats and hazards analysis, hazard mitigation, emergency preparedness, response, and recovery. The course also provides an overview of current issues, policies, best practices, and lessons learned.
Tuesdays from 6:00 – 9:20PM (PST) Virtually on Zoom.
EMP-202 Threat and Hazard Assessment for Emergency Management Professionals 3 credits
This course demonstrates the importance of risk reduction programs and the history of Threats and Hazard Identification and Risk Assessment (THIRA). Emergency management professionals must assess weaknesses and establish programs to reduce risks during preparedness for the whole community. This course will give students a basic understanding of risk management and risk prevention in emergency management. Thursdays from 6:00 – 9:20PM (PST) Virtually on Zoom.
EMP-204 Foundations of Emergency Planning 4 credits
In order for a community to be truly prepared to respond to any type of natural and/or man-made disaster, it must develop effective emergency planning. This course will introduce the multiple aspects of disaster planning. It explores the patterns of human disaster behavior, social psychology, and communication as well as the basics of generic planning actions, planning concepts, implementation, and action. Wednesdays from 6:00 – 9:20PM (PST) Virtually on Zoom.
The blaze burned more than 221,000 acres south of Lake Tahoe, CA
Caldor Fire, looking northeast from Armstrong lookout, August 29, 2021. AlertWildfire.
A father and son are now under arrest, accused of reckless arson in connection with the Caldor Fire that burned more than 221,000 acres south of Lake Tahoe in California.
David Scott Smith, 66, and Travis Shane Smith, 32, are accused of violating section 452 of the California Penal Code, commonly referred to as “reckless arson,” which causes inhabited properties to burn and results in great bodily injury to multiple victims. This type of charge can be filed against someone who unintentionally starts a fire. Both David and Travis are being held on a $1 million bail, the district attorney’s office said. They are expected to appear in court December 10.
Most of the community of Grizzly Flats burned in the Caldor Fire and forced the entire city of South Lake Tahoe to evacuate. CAL FIRE reported that the blaze destroyed 782 homes, 18 businesses, and 203 minor structures; another 81 structures were damaged but remained mostly intact. A map shows the status of structures in the area.
The El Dorado County District Attorney’s Office worked with the U.S. Forest Service, CAL FIRE, the California Department of Justice, and the Sacramento County District Attorney’s Crime Lab to investigate the cause of the fire.
Could allow for day and night water dropping and resupplying firefighters
First flight of the Kaman TITAN Unmanned Aerial Vehicle helicopter. Kaman image.
Since Kaman designed, built, and flew in 1957 the first-ever unmanned helicopter, the company’s interest in unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) has carried over into the 21st century. This year the company introduced two more UAVs, a medium and a heavy lift helicopter.
Between 2001 and 2014 two Kaman K-MAX helicopters converted to UAVs capable of autonomous or remote controlled cargo delivery transported thousands of loads of supplies and equipment to soldiers in Afghanistan. They carried more than 1.5 million pounds of cargo, sometimes through areas that would be considered unacceptably risky for human pilots. Typically operating at night, these unmanned missions replaced the equivalent of 900 convoy vehicles and eliminated 46,000 hours of exposure time to IED’s, direct fire, and other threats to our troops on dangerous roads.
Concept for Kaman KARGO Unmanned Aerial Vehicle. Kaman image.
Kaman is making a new K-MAX TITAN system which will be available on new production K-MAX helicopters or to retrofit existing K-MAX ships. The system made its initial flight April 21, 2021 of what the company calls the world’s first heavy lift unmanned helicopter for the commercial market. The aircraft can lift up to 6,000 pounds which translates to about 700 gallons of water in an external bucket.
“Kaman leads the way with innovative solutions for our customers that are reliable, affordable and sustainable. K-MAX TITAN is no exception, whether the mission calls for firefighting, humanitarian assistance, or distributed logistics,” stated Darlene Smith, President, Air Vehicles and Precision Products Divisions.
Kaman also has a contract with the U.S. Marine Corps to upgrade the autonomous capabilities of their two USMC K-MAX helicopters.
The other Kaman UAV introduced this year is the KARGO UAV. Built with the U.S. Armed Forces future operating concepts in mind, the KARGO UAV offers a rugged design for easy transport and deployment. The system’s compact form-factor fits in a standard shipping container and is designed to be unloaded and operated by as few as two people.
“The Kaman KARGO UAV is the only system of its class that is purpose-built to provide deployed Marines, Sailors, Airmen, Soldiers, and Coast Guard autonomous resupply in the lethal, fluid combat environment that future military operations will entail or for regular logistics missions. Our deployed service men and woman have persistent logistics challenges that we are answering with this reliable, maintainable and affordable solution,” said Ian Walsh, CEO of Kaman Corporation.
The company says the vehicle also has multiple commercial applications.
Designed to provide cost-effective cargo hauling in its conformal pod or external sling load configuration, the KARGO UAV will self-deploy with no payload up to 602 miles with a maximum lifting capacity of 800 pounds. It should be able to haul approximately 90 gallons of water in an external bucket.
In September, 2021, flight development testing of a scaled KARGO UAV demonstrator was completed to prove out the air vehicle design, and flight-testing of a full-scale autonomous vehicle is planned for 2022. The KARGO UAV leverages commercial off-the-shelf components as well as thousands of hours of automated and autonomous flight data from Kaman’s K-MAX TITAN program, to reduce schedule and technical risk.
Kaman worked with Near Earth Autonomy as a partner to provide obstacle avoidance and other technologies such as precision landing, sense and avoid, and navigation in a GPS-denied environment.
In 2015 near Boise, Idaho Kaman and Lockheed demonstrated for wildland fire officials how a remotely piloted K-MAX UAV could drop water on a simulated fire and carry sling loads of cargo.
Our take:
We have written quite a bit recently about new UAVs, because there is a great deal of iteration and activity in the field. Some of the aircraft are already flying and others are still in the concept stage. Not all of them will take to the air or be used in a meaningful way. However, the interest in UAVs combined with limited numbers of firefighters, advances in technology, and increasing wildland fire acres produces an environment ripe for being exploited by nimble forward-thinking companies.
It appears likely that in the near future UAV helicopters will assist wildland firefighters not only by dropping water on fires but by resupplying them in remote areas with food, drinking water, hose, water tanks, and portable pumps — day or night. Already they are used for mapping, real time intelligence, and aerial ignition.
The limiting factor is government funding, and how quickly the old guard fire hierarchy can adapt their thinking to pilotless aircraft and flying at night.
Torching Christmas tree in Manhattan, Courtesy Citizen App/WABC
A 49-year old man was taken into custody accused of setting ablaze the 50-foot Christmas tree outside Fox New’s headquarters in Midtown Manhattan early Wednesday morning.
From WABC:
Police say the 49-year-old suspect climbed up “the metal superstructure” — the tree is an artificial sculpture that is shaped to look like a tree — lit papers he brought with him on fire, and shoved the papers into the tree structure.
He then climbed down and watched from the street level as it burned, and he was spotted by building security who pointed the man out to police officers posted in nearby Rockefeller Center.
Reportedly the fire spread to some smaller decorated trees nearby, but without photographic verification, we can’t describe it as a crown fire.
The International Association of Wildland Fire will be hosting an Ignite Talk designed for mission critical teams of 4 to 12 people who must make decisions and take action quickly. It will be held online December 8 at 3 p.m. MST. Here is the link to register in advance.
More information:
WORKFORCE RESILIENCE IGNITE TALK
YOU are part of Mission Critical Teams: Reflection, Reset, and Residue in Wildland Fire Management
December 8th at 3:00 pm MST
Mission critical teams are small (4-12 agents) integrated groups of indigenously trained and educated experts who leverage tools and technology to resolve rapidly emergent complex adaptive problems in an immersive but constrained (300 seconds or less) temporal environments where the consequence of failure can be a catastrophic loss. These teams are able to consistently innovate as fast, or faster, than the evolving problem sets by moving their focus from trying to predict future problem sets to building the capacity of the team to resolve whatever problem set emerges.
Reflection: MCTs are made up of experts like you who hold the requisite skill and solutions but may lack the language to pass that knowledge on to the rest of the team, such as knowing how to ride a bike, but being unable to explain it to someone else. Leaders in Wildland Fire need to find the language to pass on their experience and navigate between critical and routine environments.
Reset: Wildland fire is about having one experience after another, throughout your career. The question is how do we make meaning of those experiences in such a way that they fuel us, rather than distract us from the next experience. Part of this is about taking the time to find purposeful meaning with After Action Reviews which actually influence the story that team members will tell about themselves, and their team, after an event.
Residue: You are not broken. You are not a victim. You are not a survivor. You have chosen the hard path—a path full of extreme experiences, both good and bad, which leave memories. These memories, in turn, leave a residue within you, which if processed can serve as the fuel that moves us to wisdom and joy. If unprocessed, however, it will begin to build up, to harden, until you can no longer move or breathe, until all you know is pain and sorrow. MCTI rejects the idea that Operators, in Medicine, Fire, Law Enforcement and Military, must sacrifice their lives and souls, in exchange for living a life of service.
Presented by Dr. Preston B. Cline
Co-founder and Director of Research and Education at the Mission Critical Team Institute; Senior Fellow, Center for Leadership and Change Management, The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania; Visiting Scholar in the Wharton Neuroscience Initiative (WiN), The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania
Preston spent 30 years in the field of Adventure Education leading expeditions on all seven continents. These journeys became the catalyst for a lifelong academic investigation on how humans learn to interact with uncertainty. Along the way, Preston has received a B.S. from Rutgers University, focusing on professional youth work, a Masters of Education from the Harvard University Graduate School of Education on risk and uncertainty, and a Doctorate in Education from the University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education on the training and education of Mission Critical Teams: Small (4-12 agents), integrated groups of indigenously trained and educated experts that leverage tools and technology to resolve complex adaptive problems in an immersive, but constrained (five minutes or less), temporal environments, where the consequence of failure can be catastrophic. In 2018, after 10 years serving as the Director of the Wharton Leadership Ventures, at the Wharton School, Preston founded the Mission Critical Team Institute, which is an applied research institute focused on the development of an international collaborative inquiry community made up of Instructor Cadres within Military Special Operations, Emergency Medicine, Tactical Law Enforcement, Aerospace, and Urban and Wilderness Fire Fighting Organizations within Australia, Canada, New Zealand, United Kingdom, and the United States. When he is not working with Cadre, he resides in Annapolis with his extraordinary spouse Amy.
Standing tall and making a difference on the Rogue River–Siskiyou National Forest
Merv George (L), Forest Supervisor, Rogue River–Siskiyou National Forest, and Dan Quinones, Fire Management Officer, Rogue River–Siskiyou National Forest. Photo courtesy of Smokejumper magazine.
By Murry Taylor
The big man leaned across the table, folded his hands, thought for a moment, then said that he wanted to make one thing clear right from the beginning: What we did on our forest this summer was partly due to the specific character of our geography, our climate, our roads, our fuels, and about mitigating future risks. All new fires during fire season received a full-suppression, aggressive initial attack approach. The big man who made this statement was Merv George, Jr., Supervisor of the Rogue River–Siskiyou National Forest (RRSNF) in southwest Oregon. And the What-we-did Merv was referring to was to initial attack 60 fires and keep the total acres burned at a little over fifty for the year. Note that in the summer of 2020, they had the same number of fires and only burned 20 acres. That is not counting the Slater Fire that came onto their forest from the Klamath N.F. and burned way up into Oregon. No fault there given it was unstoppable right from the beginning. Sitting not far from Merv was Dan Quinones (RAC ’02)- a former Redmond smokejumper, and the FMO on the RR–Siskiyou. Note, I’m not using quotation marks with these statements unless I can remember exactly what was said. Words are important to these two men. I want to make sure that’s understood.
Given the heartbreaking news of Western fires during the 2021 fire season, it was a breath of fresh air when Chuck Sheley (Editor Smokejumper magazine) and I met with Merv and Dan last October. Many of us, including a lot of Smokejumper magazine readers, have been pushing for years to get the Forest Service back to rapid and aggressive initial attack. Chuck has led the charge and now that effort (in some areas) seems to be paying off. Bill Derr’s (USFS Ret.-Law Enforcement) email thread includes several retired Forest Supervisors, FMO’s, Type 1 IC’s, Operations Chiefs, Deputy Chiefs, and Air Resource Officers. The National Wildfire Institute based in Fort Jones, California has been steadily at it as well. Add in former Forest Service Deputy Chief, Michael Rains’ “The Call to Action,” and James Petersen’s “First Put Out the Fire,” and you have major voices calling for an immediate change in how the Forest Service deals with fire these days. As you would expect, among these people it’s fully acknowledged that fire plays an important role in forest health. But, given the longer fire seasons in the West, the massive forest fuel build-up due to less logging, and the critical low fuel moisture due to climate change, it’s clear that, for the time being, we need to put out all fires during fire season as quickly as possible. It’s also understood that some fires will (even with the best effort) escape containment and go big. So, for those concerned about getting fire back on the landscape, it’s likely that plenty of acres will end up in that category anyway.
That said, you can imagine how excited we were hearing from the Rogue-River Siskiyou N.F. about their IA success in the summers of 2020 and 2021. More on that later but now, some history.
In early summer 2019, Oregon Governor Kate Brown established The Oregon Wildfire Response Council (OWRC). It seemed a good idea. I felt that a state like Oregon might make real progress on the mega-fire issue plaguing the West. First, as a relatively small state, they are more politically agile—certainly more than California. Secondly, the timber industry has had–and still has–a strong influence in Oregon politics. And third, both private industry and the Oregon Department of Forestry (with its emphasis on strong initial attack) have historically leaned on the Forest Service to put stronger emphasis on more aggressive fire suppression.
So, I did some research and contacted Ken Cummings, Regional Manager at Hancock Natural Resources Group in Central Point, Oregon. He was on the OWR Council and put me in touch with Committee Chairman, Matt Donegan and concerned citizen, Guy McMahon in Brookings. Kate Brown’s office wrote back and put me in touch with an aide to Senator Jeff Merkley. Within a month Jim Klump (RDD ’64 – former Redding smokejumper and FMO on the Plumas N.F.) and I went to Salem to attend an Oregon Wildfire Response Council meeting. Senator Merkley’s aid was there. After speaking with both the aide and Matt Donegan about what might be done locally, I decided to contact my two local Forest Supervisors, Merv George Jr. on the Rogue River-Siskiyou and Rachel Smith on the Klamath.
Wrangle Fire Siskiyou #282, Aug. 2021. USFS photo by Grand Ronde Engine 113. Rogue River–Siskiyou National Forest.
When Merv George Jr. agreed to our first meeting (that was in June), I took a half-dozen copies of Smokejumper magazine to give to him. These were the ones in which Chuck beat the “strong initial attack and keep them small” drum hard. Early in the meeting, not long after I’d brought up the subject of strong IA, Merv leaned forward and told me straight-faced, you’re looking at one of the most aggressive IA Forest Supervisors you’ve ever met. He went on to explain that his Hoopa Native American heritage has helped him understand the difference between “good” fires and the devastation that “bad” fires can cause. He also understands the need to put fire back in the woods and, more importantly, the right times to put it there. He went on to explain that he raised his hand for the RRSNF position to try to “fix” the problem. The “problem” being the large fires of late on the forest—the Chetco Bar, (192,000 acres), the Klondike (175,258 acres), and the Taylor (53,000 acres) to mention three. That got me thinking that there could be a big success story if the Rogue River–Siskiyou could showcase that, with the right preparedness and IA effort, you could put out most all fires.
Then, while serving as Duzel Rock Fire Lookout (for Cal Fire) this summer, I got a call from Dan Quinones. That was late July. At that point, they had had 48 total fires, 31 lightning and 17 man-caused. Total acres burned, less than ten. Then he said the other thing (when added to Merv’s comment about being an aggressive IA Forest Supervisor) that made me want to write this article: “Our crews are going around with smiles on their faces. We’re having fun.” I thought to myself, this is it. This is what most old-time firedogs have been saying all along. If you encourage your crews to get out there and go after fires and put them out small, they will naturally become excited and connect with the passion of good firefighting.
Smoke near Winkle Bar airstrip discovered by Siskiyou Rappellers, Aug. 2021, Rogue River–Siskiyou National Forest. USFS photo.
Such passion comes directly from successful initial attack. It comes from those times when a crew hits a fire, works into the night, works until they feel tired and hungry and miserable but keep going, digging deep and finding that better part of themselves. That part they instinctively hoped was there. Then, once they catch their fire and walk off the mountain in the morning they feel like kings, and nothing can ever take that feeling away. It’s the tough times that build the kind of character that make great wildland firefighters. The tough times are transforming, and they are empowering. I think this point is not widely understood by many current wildland fire managers. Time after time I’ve heard from various crews, “Murry, they’re ruining firefighting. They’re holding us in camp too much. They’re not letting us do our job.”
I heard it again this past summer and not just from crews but from a Central California Type 1 Incident Commander, his Ops Chief and Plans Chief. Their take: Too many times effective work could have been done. Too many times crews and related resources were held back by the local forest. The IC told me straight out, “It’s this safety thing. The safety card is played too much. Too many times it’s too steep and it’s too rough. He went on to point out that by backing off and slacking off, these fires go way big and expose crews to thousands of miles of road trips—often when exhausted–thousands of helicopter rides into unimproved helispots and tens of thousands of miles of fireline with burning trees and snags.”
