A preliminary report has been released for an accident that involved a firefighter who sustained a broken leg on July 20 and was extracted by short-haul the next day. This occurred on the Gregg Creek Fire in the Willamette National Forest east of Corvallis, Oregon. Earlier, the Linn County Sheriff’s Office issued a press release with some basic information, but on July 26 the Willamette National Forest, over the signature of Forest Supervisor Tracy Beck, filed a “72-Hour Preliminary Report” approximately 144 hours after the extraction.
Below is the narrative and a photo from the report:
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“On July 20th, at approximately 2100 hours a Type Two IA crew was hiking off of the Gregg Creek Fire when a crewmember fell and sustained a lower leg injury. Crew EMT’s assessed the patient using the Medical Incident Report in the IRPG indicating “Priority-YELLOW (serious injury)”. The IC of the fire requested aerial extraction of the injured person though Eugene Interagency Dispatch (EICC). An additional 20 person hand crew, paramedics and overhead were dispatched to the incident to support medical evacuation operations while EICC pursued night time aerial extraction options. Both Oregon Air National Guard and United States Coast Guard were contacted for possible night time aerial extraction.
At 0303 hours on July 21st aerial extraction was attempted by the US Coast Guard without success due to excessive rotor wash creating additional hazards (ember showers and snags falling). Local cooperator Paramedics hiked in and were able to assist with patient care. A short-haul mission was ordered for first light.
At approximately 0830 hours short-haul operations were completed by a National Park Service short-haul capable helicopter which was prepositioned in the area due to fire activity. The patient was transported to a hospital and treated for a broken fibula and associated ankle injuries requiring surgery.”
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On July 21, 2015 at Corvallis, Oregon a helicopter would have been permitted to begin flying at 5:18 a.m. PT, which was 30 minutes before sunrise.
Sunday night CAL FIRE released the following additional information about the four fighters that sustained burns on July 26:
Early [Sunday] evening, two CAL FIRE and two U.S. Forest Service firefighters suffered burn injuries while battling the Lowell Fire in Nevada County. The firefighters were airlifted from the fire and transported to UC Davis Burn Center in Sacramento.
The two CAL FIRE personnel and one of the U.S. Forest Service firefighters are likely to be treated and released [Sunday] evening. The remaining U.S. Forest Service firefighter is being admitted with serious burn injuries.
CAL FIRE has activated one of its Serious Accident Review Teams to review the incident.
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(Originally published at 9:17 p.m., July 26, 2015)
Four fighters sustained burn injuries on the Lowell Fire 46 air miles northeast of Sacramento on Sunday. CAL FIRE Public Information Officer Daniel Berlant said they were airlifted and paramedics were assessing their condition.
The Lowell Fire started July 25 and CAL FIRE is calling it 1,500 acres.
We will update this article as more information becomes available.
“At approximately 7:35 a.m. on July 12, a Stanislaus NF Type 3 engine was involved in a two vehicle collision which resulted in both vehicles rolling several times. The engine, on a cover assignment to the Sierra NF for lightning activity, was travelling east on Hwy 168, enroute to Prather Work Center for a briefing.
Responders from other Forest Service engines in the strike team, as well as CALFIRE, CHP and local EMS, were able to extricate the crew members and transport them to local hospitals. Three crew members sustained minor injuries, two of which were treated and released, while one crew member was held for observation overnight. The two more seriously injured crew members remain hospitalized in stable condition.
Hospital liaisons and patient advocates are in place supporting the firefighters and their families. A Peer Support Team as well as a Learning Review Team is in place. Upon completion, the final Facilitated Learning Review will be released thru the Wildland Lessons Learned center.
/s/ Kevin B. Elliott
Kevin B. Elliott
FLA Team Leader”
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.
Five firefighters were injured, one seriously, when this engine collided with another vehicle near Clovis, California. Photo by California Highway Patrol.
Five U.S. Forest Service firefighters were injured when their Stanislaus National Forest fire engine collided with a small SUV at 7:30 a.m. Sunday, July 12 near Clovis, California (map).
According to the U.S. Forest Service, one of the firefighters had major injuries, another had moderate injuries, and the other three firefighters sustained minor injuries.
The driver of the SUV had minor injuries as well.
The firefighters were providing additional fire suppression coverage for the Sierra National Forest and were traveling from their hotel to the High Sierra Ranger District in Prather, California. There are no major wildfires on the Sierra National Forest at this time.
MyMotherload.com had some information about the cause of the crash:
Update on July 12 at 6am: The CHP reports that 53-year-old Maria Constable of Fresno was attempting to pass the fire engine in her Kia SUV, but collided with the side door. Both vehicles had been traveling east on Highway 168. The sideswipe caused the fire truck to drive off the road and overturn four times before ending up on its side. Constable’s SUV rolled over twice and landed on its rooftop. The crash is under investigation.
The MAFFS 3 air tanker experienced a hard landing at Hill Air Force Base, Utah, Aug. 17, 2014 following an in flight emergency. There were no injuries and only minor damage to the aircraft. Photo supplied by Hill AFB, Utah. (click to enlarge)
The MAFFS C-130 crew was attempting to land at Hill Air Force Base, Utah after conducting aerial firefighting missions in southern Utah Aug. 17, 2014 when Maj. Jack Berquist, aircraft commander, and George, co-pilot, realized the nose landing gear was not functioning properly.
“As we were approaching to land, Maj. Berquist, who was flying, asked for the gear down. After lowering the landing gear we got an unsafe gear indication in the nose,” said George.
The crew stayed in the traffic pattern at Hill and started on their emergency procedures. There are three ways to get the nose landing gear down but none of them worked. They called a Lockheed Martin engineer and test pilot but neither call fixed the problem. The U.S. Forest Service sent a lead plane to see if that pilot could determine what was wrong from flying underneath the aircraft, but again, nothing helped. After more than three hours of circling the airfield, the crew determined they had no other choice but to attempt a landing.
“At that point we said, ‘well, we are out of options, we are just going to land with the nose gear up.’ We called the tower, and they were able to put foam on the runway, that way it would arrest any fire that might start. We ran our checklists again, making sure we hadn’t forgotten anything. Jack Berquist was flying, he did a fantastic job. I don’t think he could’ve done any better. He held the nose up as long as possible and was able to get the nose on the ground in the foam,” said George.
The aircraft came to a stop and the tower let the crew know a small fire started under the nose. The crew shut everything down and egressed to a safe area. The emergency crews on the ground quickly put the fire out.
“The most rewarding thing of the whole day was how well the crew worked together,” said George, who has nearly 1,500 C-130 and more than 3,700 total flight hours. “The navigator was Active Duty, I was a Reservist. The other four crew members were Wyoming Air National Guard. It was very seamless. Everybody knew exactly what to do. MAFFS crews are some of the most highly experienced and best trained crews in the Air Force.”
The efforts by the MAFFS 3 crew resulted in the safe return of six airmen and only minor damage to a $37 million aircraft.
“Other than the fact that there was a mechanical malfunction, which is pretty rare, there was nothing that surprised me about this event. We look for top notch people, we train hard. They tried ‘A,’ they tried ‘B,’ they tried ‘C,’ and they ended up having to do ‘D,'” said Lt. Col. Luke Thompson, 302nd AW chief of aerial firefighting. “It all worked, just the way it should have.”
Besides Berquist, Goebel and George, the other crew members were flight engineer Tech. Sgt. Damian Hoffmann, and load masters, Master Sgts. Brandon York and Christian Reese.
Four C-130 wings perform the MAFFS mission, each providing two MAFFS-capable aircraft and the air and ground crews needed to operate them. They are the 145th Airlift Wing, North Carolina Air National Guard; 146th Airlift Wing, California Air National Guard; 153rd Airlift Wing, Wyoming Air National Guard; and the 302nd Airlift Wing, Air Force Reserve Command, in Colorado.
There were more requests for large air tankers (LATs) in 2014 than in any of the last 18 years. That is one of the facts in the 2014 version of the Wildland Fire Summary and Statistics put together by the National Interagency Fire Center.
We used data from the report to update statistics that we have been collecting over the years, including the chart below.
One of the more interesting trends is the number of requests for LATs that cannot be filled, referred to as Unable to Fill, or UTF. After reaching a high of 48 percent in 2012, it declined to 21 and then 12 percent in the next two years even as the number of requests for LATs was increasing.
One thing we don’t know is how many Incident Commanders needed air tankers but didn’t bother to request them because they knew that none were available.
Two stats for 2014 indicate there would be a reduced urgent need for air tankers. The number of acres burned in the 48 contiguous states in 2014, 3.4 million, was significantly below the 10 year average of 5.7 million. And the number of structures burned, 1,953 was less than the 10 year average of 3,098.
At the beginning of 2014 there were 10 LATs on exclusive use contracts. By the end of the year there were 17 — eight were added and Minden’s P2V had a landing gear problem (see below) which took it out of service indefinitely. The additional air tankers on exclusive use contracts included:
2 RJ-85s from Aero Flite;
2 MD-87s from Erickson Aero Tanker;
1 DC-10 from 10 Tanker Air Carrier; and
3 BAe-146s from Neptune
In the list of eight additional air tankers listed above, the DC-10 and the three BAe-146s were brought into service as “additional equipment” on a 1-year temporary basis under an exclusive use contract awarded in 2013. Due to a change in Department of the Interior procurement policies, this will not be done again in 2015.
Minden was awarded a Next-Gen contract for a BAe-146 in 2013, but never delivered the aircraft. Recently the USFS terminated the contract for default.
The MAFFS 3 air tanker experienced a hard landing at Hill Air Force Base on August 17. There were no injuries. Photo supplied by the Air Force, originally from Fox 13.
One air tanker was borrowed in 2014 from Canada for 10 days. Saskatchewan provided a Convair 580 and a TurboCommander 690 Bird Dog beginning on July 21. The air tanker group was in place until July 30, when it returned to Canada following a recall from Saskatchewan due to increased fire activity there.
Two Modular Airborne FireFighting System aircraft, C-130s from the military, were activated on July 20 and positioned at Boise. MAFFS 3 experienced a hard landing at Hill AFB when they had a problem with the nose landing gear. While no injuries occurred, the damage ended the service of MAFFS 3 for 2014, but MAFFS1 remained until August 24. MAFFS units provided retardant delivery to the Great Basin, Northwest and Northern Rocky Geographic Areas while employed from July 20 through August 24, delivering a total of 244,406 gallons while conducting 97 sorties. This is down from 2013 when 576 sorties were flown delivering 1,387,881 gallons of retardant.
Other notable aircraft mishaps or crashes in 2014:
Pilot Geoffrey “Craig” Hunt was killed when his S-2T air tanker impacted the ground while he was attempting to make his second retardant drop on the Dog Rock Fire October 7 near Yosemite National Park in California.
Tanker 73, one of CAL FIRE’s 23 S-2Ts, had a problem while landing at Hemet-Ryan Airport Friday, October 3 in southern California. The preliminary information indicated that it was a landing gear issue.
A Bell 206-L3 made a crash landing into a river May 29 while recertifying for water bucket operations near Missoula, Montana.
On June 15, Minden’s P2V, Tanker 48, was substantially damaged when the nose wheel landing gear collapsed during landing roll at the Fresno Yosemite International Airport (FAT), Fresno, California.
An air attack plane under contract to the Department of the Interior crashed May 17 at Fort Huachuca, Arizona. The Rockwell Aero Commander 500S impacted the ground shortly after takeoff. The aircraft was on an orientation flight for a new pilot on the air attack contract. Two company employees, but no agency personnel, were on board. There was an unconfirmed report that one person died several days later.
The MAFFS 3 air tanker experienced a hard landing at Hill Air Force Base on August 17. There were no injuries. Photo supplied by the Air Force, originally from Fox 13.
CHEYENNE, Wyo. – A guard, reserve and active duty aircrew aboard a Wyoming Air National Guard C-130H3, recently received the Air Mobility Command Chief of Safety Aircrew of Distinction Award for its efforts following a landing gear malfunction while fighting fires in southern Utah on August 17, 2014..
The Modular Airborne Firefighting System (MAFFS) #3 air tanker crew had finished two successful fire retardant drops when it was instructed to reload for a third drop at Hill Air Force Base in northern Utah. As the crew prepared to land, Maj. Jack Berquist, aircraft commander, and his co-pilot, Maj. Derik George, noticed the nose gear wasn’t functioning properly. At that point, the crew, including the navigator Capt. Brett Goebel, flight engineer Tech. Sgt. Damian Hoffmann, and load masters, Master Sgts. Brandon York and Christian Reese, began troubleshooting the problem. Berquist also began communicating with Hill Air Force Base’s air traffic control about the issue.
Greg Brubaker sent the photo below to Fire Aviation. He said he noticed the aircraft was flying in the area for over an hour and he observed that the nose gear was not visible. Photo by Greg Brubaker.
After two hours of circling and with only about 30 minutes of fuel remaining, the crew realized they had exhausted all of their options. That’s when Berquist directed his crew to prepare for an emergency crash landing. Preparations included having Hill officials spray foam on the runway and having crash fire rescue personnel in place.
After configuring the disabled aircraft, Berquist landed the plane and held the nose up off the ground as long as possible, before gently bringing it in contact with the runway. Berquist was able to bring the aircraft to a smooth stop on the center of the runway and the crew exited the plane without any injuries.
The efforts by the MAFFS 3 crew resulted in the safe return of six airmen and only minor damage to a $37 million aircraft.
“In-flight emergencies and emergency landings do happen,” said Goebel. “We train extensively year-round in the aircraft and simulator for unlikely events such as these.
“Without a doubt, we provide some of the best training and preparation of any professional flying organization from not only an individual, but also a crew standpoint. This was definitely a crew effort!”
Tankers 105, 06, and 101 (L to R) at Redmond Oregon, June 8, 2014. Photo by Jeff Ingelse.
According to an FAA report, one of Erickson Aero Tanker’s aircraft was struck by a garbage truck while parked at San Antonio, Texas January 5, 2015. There were no injuries, and the amount of damage to Tanker 105 is unknown.
The aircraft is an MD-87, N295EA, first certified by the Interagency Airtanker Board in 2014. One of its sister air tankers, T-101, made the first drop on a fire by an MD-87 June 7 on the Two Bulls Fire west of Bend, Oregon.
The aircraft is off contract now and the start date for 2015 hasn’t been determined.
A phone call to Erickson Aero Tanker was not returned.
An unusual accident occurred Sunday in San Miguel, Chile. A medical helicopter had landed at an accident scene where a drunk driver had struck a police car in an urban area. While the ship’s rotors were still turning, a fire engine received authorization to drive through the accident scene and unfortunately, drove into the main rotor. As the engine continued down the street, the helicopter hit something causing the tail boom to be bent sideways at about 90 degrees. With the rotors still turning the ship began spinning and eventually crashed into a police car, which stopped the spinning but caused an explosion.
The seriously injured pilot and three officers who had been in the police car previous to the arrival of the helicopter were transferred to the hospital.
In the first video the fire engine/helicopter accident occurs at about 2:08. The helicopter has the brightest light in the video, at the lower-center of the image.
Below is the description of the video, translated by Google from Spanish:
With the helicopter and landed on Grand Avenue the exact time the Fire truck goes and hits the blades of the main rotor of the helicopter is appreciated. The outcome is already known through other videos. Best wishes for recovery to the wounded especially the helicopter pilot . We hope this video will help clarify what happened.
This second video, only 15 seconds long, has a better view of the spinning helicopter impacting the police car.
The description of the video, again, translated by Google from Spanish:
The video is not recorded by me, is taken from instagram account of : sergio_robles
Accident happened at 4:42 am on November 30, 2014 at the intersection of Fourth Avenue and Gran Avenida José Miguel Carrera. Helicopter Aeropolicial prefecture attends the help of another procedure where police were wounded , the helicopter landing engages the telescopic ladder of a fire engine causing it to split in two and the explosion.
The IC of the fire requested aerial extraction of the injured person though Eugene Interagency Dispatch (EICC). An additional 20 person hand crew, paramedics and overhead were dispatched to the incident to support medical evacuation operations while EICC pursued night time aerial extraction options. Both Oregon Air National Guard and United States Coast Guard were contacted for possible night time aerial extraction.
