Wildfire Today

News and opinion about wildland fire

Wildfire Today

Tag: BehavePlus

A new app to predict wildland fire behavior

Author Bill GabbertPosted on Categories UncategorizedTags , , ,

Wildfire Analyst Pocket appTechnosylva has released a new free app for smart phones that can help predict fire behavior. It is called Wildfire Analyst Pocket and is available for Android phones. It will soon be on the Apple app store as well.

In a video filmed May 21, 2018, the president of the company, Joaquin Ramirez, introduces us to the app.

Technosylva is one of the companies that produce systems available now that could lead toward the Holy Grail of Wildland Firefighter Safety, tracking in real time the location of firefighters and a wildfire.

Kansas Fire Chief says nozzlemen have to ride on their trucks

Author Bill GabbertPosted on Categories UncategorizedTags , , , 16 Comments on Kansas Fire Chief says nozzlemen have to ride on their trucks

Above: A Kansas firefighter makes a mobile attack on a grass fire from the truck. Screen grab from the KAKE video below.

Brad Ewy, Chief of the Cheney Fire Department in Kansas says their firefighters have to ride on their trucks while doing a mobile attack on a grass fire.

You take a fire when the wind’s blowing 30 miles an hour that fire’s going to be going 30 miles per hour and there’s no way we could keep up with it. We have to be on our trucks.

They (NFPA) don’t deal with grass fires like we had. The one we had in Medicine Lodge, the fire’s running 50 miles per hour. There’s absolutely no way.

There may or may not be a way to operate a nozzle safely while riding on a fire engine, but I would like to see the actual data or a BehavePlus calculation that predicts a 30 mph hour wind will cause a fire to spread at 30 mph, or a 50 mph wind will produce a 50 mph rate of spread.

Notice in the video that the crew does not take the time to cut the fence. They simply drive through it, even with the firefighter standing on the front of the truck.