Tag: helicopter

National Guard helicopter pilots, inmate crews, and recruits for the Bear Mountain hand crew trained with live fire in Custer State Park in the Black Hills of South Dakota on Friday. The pilots were from Guard units in South Dakota and North Dakota while the inmates were from the Department of Corrections’ Rapid City Minimum Security Unit.

Here is an excerpt from the Rapid City Journal:

Friday was the first time on the fire line for 20 members of a Department of Corrections crew. They were joined by 10 Bear Mountain crew recruits who did fire training course work online but needed the day in the field, [public information officer Beth] Hermanson said.

“They’re learning how to read fire behavior,” Hermanson said.

State fire agency trainers spent a week in the classroom at the state’s Minimum Security Unit in Rapid City training the Department of Corrections firefighters. Crew members receive 40 hours of basic wildland training.

“They’ve spent the last two days in the classroom, and now, they’re out here on the fire, actually using the skills they learned in the classroom in a practical setting,” [South Dakota Wildland Fire Coordinator Joe] Lowe said.

The crews also learned to lay hoses and operate water pumps.

And they learned to work with air support provide by the Blackhawks. While crews trained on the ground, 21 helicopter pilots were training overhead. Ten North Dakota and 11 South Dakota National Guard pilots completed the training runs they need before they can respond to fires. Each pilot had to make three runs towing a bucket filled with 660 gallons of water. Pilots are required to make three drops — mid-slope, downhill and uphill. At the same time, they must coordinate those drops with an air boss circling the drop site. The pilots must also keep in contact with the crew working below them.

The aerial support is vital to fighting fires in the Black Hills, Lowe said. “The Black Hills burns.”

Each year, Gov. Mike Rounds gives Lowe the authority to activate National Guard helicopters for firefighting.

An interagency compact between the state, U.S. Forest Service and the National Park Service also gives the state the ability to handle most fires in a fire-prone area with homes in the forest, Lowe said.

“We’re a force to be reckoned with,” Lowe said.

Every year in California the National Guard, Cal Fire, and the federal fire agencies get together to refresh, certify, and re-certify as needed for operating National Guard helicopters on wildland fires. This year the training was held at the Cal Fire academy at Ione, California, April 9-11.

The National Guard brought six helicopters, three Blackhawks and three Chinooks.

The 120 attendees spent the first day of the three-day training in classrooms and the last two days were devoted to flying, making water drops on mountain targets. In addition to certifying or re-certifying the military pilots, civilians with extensive helicopter manager experience can receive training for the Military Helicopter Manager position. New Managers fly as a trainee until they can complete all items in a Military Helicopter Managers task book. The military does the same with pilots. The chief pilot in the military does the “check ride” and signs off those pilots who are ready for the fire mission.

Thanks to  John Yount and Bob Martinez

Do you remember when an Erickson Air-Crane was used to drop water on burning structures in flooded downtown Grand Forks, North Dakota in 1997? A new video has appeared on YouTube describing the incident.

via @FireInfoGirl

Here is the text of an Interagency Aviation Safety Alert that was issued on March 23, 2010 by the U.S. Forest Service. It describes damage to a helicopter rotor blade when someone attempted to throw a knife from inside the helicopter to someone standing nearby.  Click on it to see a larger version.

The safety alert goes on to explain that a similar incident happened a few years ago when a second rocket scientist did the same thing with a set of keys. The document ends with this:

Two companies have collaborated to develop a helicopter water bucket that incorporates a gel-mixing system. The bucket has an electric pump in the bottom that can fill the bucket with water from a water source that is only 12 inches deep. As the bucket fills, the gel, which is stored in a bag inside the bucket, is pumped into the inbound water flow, below the pump.  Both the water and gel are drawn through the pump’s impeller, thoroughly mixing the gel into the water.

This system can eliminate the need to set up a separate tank and gel mixing operation to fill helicopter buckets.

Multiple sizes of gel bags are available, 15-90 gallons, such that at common mixture ratios (1%) the system can inject gel for a full fuel cycle (15-20 drops).

The system was developed by Thermo-Gel, which is a supporter of Wildfire Today, and Absolute Fire Solutions.