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 National Interagency Fire Center has released their annual summary of wildfire activity in 2013. In the aviation section one of the stats we always find interesting is the number of requests for large air tankers that are unable to be filled (UTF). That is, when firefighters officially submit a request for an air tanker but there are none available because all of them are committed to fires, they are on their day off, or they have a mechanical problem.
An air tanker having a day off is ridiculous, especially when the fleet size has atrophied from 44 at the beginning of 2002 down to nine when the 2013 fire season began. But that is the way the U.S. Forest Service writes their contracts for large air tankers.
During the 2002 fire season the wings literally fell off two air tankers, killing five aviators, causing the USFS to begin grounding the older museum pieces that summer, continuing the process into 2004. Since then the UTF rate has been climbing. Much of the time when firefighters need air tankers there are none available, reaching a high of 48 percent in 2012.
After 2004 when the groundings settled down and the fleet size ranged from 9 to 21, the average UTF rate was 26 percent. In 2013 it was 21 percent. Before the two wing failures, with 40 air tankers on contract the average UTF rate was 7 percent for 2000 through 2001.
In articles like this pointing out how the air tanker fleet has decreased by 75% over the last 11 years, we usually mention that air tankers don’t put out fires. Under ideal conditions of moderate burning conditions without a strong wind, they can sometimes slow down a fire making it easier for firefighters on the ground to make better progress and actually stop the fire. It is one tool in the toolbox. But an *aggressive, prompt, initial attack with overwhelming force both on the ground and from the air is more likely to keep a new fire small than what we have seen in recent years with reductions in the number of firefighters and aircraft. An aggressive attack can prevent a small fire from becoming a megafire that can cost over $100 million.
In 2013 there were nine fires with suppression costs exceeding $10 million. The Rim Fire in and near Yosemite National Park ran up bills amounting to $127 million.. And those dollar figures do not include the damage to privately owned property or the lives lost. Information provided by the USFS shows that 11,625 homes burned in wildfires over the last three years; and they don’t have records for ALL structures that burn in wildfires across the nation. If those houses had an average value of $100,000, we are looking at a monetary value of $1.1 trillion. During that three year period 60 people were killed in wildfires, including firefighters and local residents.
While the number of acres burned in wildfires in the United States in 2013 (minus Alaska) was lower than the recent trend, the number of air tanker requests that were filled (1,017) was four times higher than the average between 2002 and 2012, which was 252 per year. The year with the second highest number of filled requests since 2002 was 2011 when large air tankers were requested 407 times.
We are at a loss to come up with a reason for the unprecedented increase in the number of filled requests, in a year that had the fourth lowest number of acres burned in the lower 49 states in the last 10 years. The number of requests for large air tankers was 1,343, compared to an average of 434 per year.
The information in this report might be 100 percent right and truthful. But, sadly, we are now forced to look at these and other statistics coming out of Boise and the Interagency Fire Center and consider that they may or may not be accurate. We learned a lesson after the U.S. Forest Service issued their “FY 2013 Aviation Safety Summary” last month which claimed there were no USFS aircraft accidents in the last three years. At least four accidents since 2008 with a total of nine fatalities, including the 2012 crash of the MAFFS air tanker on a USFS fire which killed four aviators, do not show up in their stats. Nor are they even mentioned anywhere in the report. Their use of imaginative criteria for leaving out certain accidents made it appear that they had a pretty good accident record, when the opposite is true.
That lesson learned means we now have to look at these Boise reports and question their accuracy. This is really unfortunate. It casts doubt on reports and statistics that might have the potential for us to learn other lessons that could enhance the safety of firefighters at the point of the spear — busting their asses out on hot, steep, dusty, smoky, rocky slopes in the middle of nowhere for weeks at a time.
(Originally published at 11:19 MDT, September 28, 2013; updated at 6 p.m. September 28, 2013. Observations after reading the report are at the bottom of this article.)
The Arizona State Forestry Division has released the Serious Accident Investigation report of the Yarnell Hill Fire, which on June 30, 2013, killed 19 members of the Granite Mountain Hotshots. It was produced by a very large cast of characters, 18 core Team Members, 17 Support Team Members, and 19 Subject Matter Experts, for a total of 54 people.
The report found:
The judgments and decisions of the incident management organizations managing this fire were reasonable. Firefighters performed within their scope of duty, as defined by their respective organizations. The Team found no indication of negligence, reckless actions, or violations of policy or protocol.
Air Attack’s photo of the Yarnell Hill fire at 7:24 p.m. June 29, 2013
A news conference about the report was live-streamed by at least two Phoenix area television stations. In the question and answer period several national news organizations as well as local media asked questions of the five-person panel which consisted of the Arizona State Forester, two people from the investigation team, and two officers from the Prescott Fire Department.
Below is a 21-minute video released by the investigation team today, which they described as a “A brief overview of the Yarnell Hill Fire Investigation report.” Much of it comes word for word from the report but it makes effective use of Google Earth to provide an overview of the geography of the fire.
Granite Mountain Hotshot Christopher MacKenzie shot the two video clips below shortly after 4:00 p.m. on June 30, 2013. These are the last images of the hotshots before they died. The video was unexpectedly made available today for the first time by the Prescott Daily Courier, which has an article about how the video and other photos of the fire were found.
Our observations after reading the report and viewing the press conference and the question and answer session.
The official report commissioned by the Arizona State Forestry Division, a case of them investigating themselves, did not break much new ground. There was little of a negative nature written about the crew or their employer, the Prescott Fire Department, which was barely mentioned. The Granite Mountain Hotshots were fully qualified, staffed, and trained and they were on day 13 of a permitted 14 days in a row of fighting fire. And, there was “no indication of negligence, recklessness actions, or violations of policy or protocol”.
Why did the Granite Mountain 19 leave the “black”?
The investigators emphasized that they were unable to answer one of the most-asked questions about the fatalities — why the crew left the safety of the already burned area, the black, to attempt to walk 1.6 miles mostly through unburned brush to another safety zone, the Boulder Springs Ranch. They came to within 0.38 miles of their destination when they encountered one of the heads of the fire that had wrapped around the ridge to their left in the box canyon and was headed toward them, cutting off their path probably much to their surprise. Click the map below to see a larger version of the wind at the deployment site.
No one knew where the crew was in relation to the fire
There was confusion about the location of the crew. Other firefighters thought they had either remained safely in the black where they had been for a while, or they had headed north to another safety zone. But instead, they traveled south. When they reported that they were entrapped and were deploying their fire shelters, no one knew where they were. Finally they told Air Attack they were on the “south side”, but even though a DC-10 air tanker was orbiting and ready to drop on them, airborne personnel could not find them, either due to heavy smoke or because they were looking in the wrong place. But under the extreme wind and fire conditions, it is unlikely that air support would have helped the firefighters very much.
Improving situational awareness
This is another fire, like the Esperanza Fire, where if the fire overhead, such as a Division Supervisor, Operations Section Chief, or Safety Officer, had known the location of the personnel on the fire in relation to the real-time spread of the fire, it could have saved lives — 24 on these two fires alone.
It is irresponsible for the wildland fire agencies to continue to do nothing to improve the situational awareness of firefighters, which has proved fatal to too many of them.
We have written about this several times before. Many local fire departments, EMS divisions, and police units have the ability to send location data to dispatchers. If the analog or digital ground-based radio systems being used today can’t handle this task in remote areas, then use a satellite-based system. The U.S. Forest Service asked for proposals to purchase thousands of little location devices last year, and adding high tech video systems to air attack ships could help. We have also written about a device we called a Firefighter’s Emergency Situational Awareness Device, a FESAD.
One of the recommendations in the report was to “review current technology that could increase resource tracking, communications, real time weather, etc.” The Q&A panel today said, in response to a question, that the surviving family members of the 19 Hotshots strongly suggested while being briefed this morning that tracking systems for firefighters be utilized.
Very Large Air Tanker not ordered because of “steep terrain”
The information that the state of Arizona released on July 16 about the resources deployed on the fire said a DC-10 Very Large Air Tanker (VLAT) was in Albuquerque and available on June 29, but was not ordered due to Air Attack’s concern about its effectiveness in steep terrain and inability to deliver retardant before cut-off time. The way this was addressed in today’s report was “ICT4 declines the VLAT offer at 1750 [June 29] based on fire conditions.” There was nothing about “steep terrain”, which didn’t exist on the fire to the extent that it would severely limit the effectiveness of a DC-10 VLAT. In fact, the next day, June 30, they used the hell out of both DC-10s, dropping over 88,000 gallons in 8 flights. A recommendation in today’s report was to “…develop a brief technical tip for fire supervisors/agency administrators on the effective use of VLATs.”
Air tanker drops on Yarnell Hill Fire, June 29 and 30, 2013.
The DC-10s may have been effective on June 29 when the fire was still small, but by the time they both arrived on June 30, the day of the entrapment, the wind event was making it difficult for anything dropped from the air to slow down the fire — too much heat, and too much wind blowing the retardant away before it hit the target.
Aerial Supervision Module taking on too many roles?
During the time of the entrapment the roles of Air Attack and Lead Plane were filled by a single aircraft called an Aerial Supervision Module (ASM), coordinating all of the aerial firefighting, directing air traffic, preventing aircraft from bumping into each other, developing tactics, AND serving as Lead Plane, physically leading the air tankers into their targets about 200 feet above the ground. The Lead Plane duties limited their ability to perform full Air Attack responsibilities over the fire at the same time. The report said, “ASM was too busy handling multiple duties to communicate with the crew just prior to the deployment”.
One of the recommendations in the report is to request the National Wildfire Coordinating Group to develop guidance to identify at what point is it necessary to separate the ASM and Air Attack roles to carry out required responsibilities for each platform.
No overwhelming force
The ordering and use of ground and aerial firefighting resources was less than aggressive on June 29, the day before the tragedy when the fire was still small. The only air tankers used that day were two single engine air tankers, and for only part of the day, dropping a total of 7,626 gallons. After being released, they were requested again by Air Attack, but dispatch only allowed one to respond to the fire, wanting to keep one in reserve in case there were other fires. General Norman Schwarzkopf’s philosophy when confronting the enemy was to use “overwhelming force”. This strategy also is effective when confronting a wildfire. Overwhelming force for a short amount of time can prevent megafires burning for weeks, consuming many acres, dollars, and sometimes homes and lives.
The Arizona State Forestry Division has issued a report that summarizes information about some of the major events and the firefighting resources that were deployed for the Yarnell Hill Fire on which 19 members of the Granite Mountain Hotshot crew were killed.
A very quick summary: according to the report, 24 hours after the Yarnell Hill Fire was reported, it had burned only 6 acres — 23 hours after that 19 firefighters were dead. It seems too unlikely to believe.
The fire, caused by lightning, was reported at 5:40 p.m. The Yarnell Volunteer Fire Department responded, but they were not sure they could access it. The fire was not staffed at night for safety and lack of access reasons. The last reported size that day was one acre. Air Attack flew over the fire but there was no mention of any helicopters or air tankers being used. There were multiple lightning-caused fires in that part of the state.
A spot weather forecast from the National Weather Service predicted for Saturday, hot (102-104 degrees), dry (10-11% relative humidity), winds light (W-SW 6-10 gusts to 14 m.p.h.), very little relative humidity recovery at night, and the possibility of high based showers or thunderstorms with a slight chance of moisture. If thunderstorms developed, the fire area could experience gusty winds.
Saturday, June 29, 2013
Six firefighters were flown in to the fire and began work. They estimated the fire had burned two to four acres. Continue reading
The Arizona State Forestry Division has issued a report that summarizes information about some of the major events and the firefighting resources that were deployed for the Yarnell Hill Fire. This new document corrects some of the information reported by the Associated Press below.
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(UPDATE at 10:15 a.m. MDT, July 13, 2013)
We checked with Rick Hatton, CEO of 10 Tanker Air Carrier, the company that operates the two DC-10 air tankers, about the use of their aircraft on the Yarnell Hill Fire. Mr. Hatton said each of their two DC-10s, which carry 11,600 gallons, made five drops on the fire. Throughout the day on Sunday June 30, the day of the tragedy, they made a total of eight drops, and then made two more on July 1.
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(Originally published at 8:20 p.m. July 12, 2013)
The Associated Press is reporting that a request for six “heavy” air tankers was placed about 50 minutes before the Granite Mountain Hotshots became entrapped and deployed their fire shelters on the Yarnell Hill Fire. However the request was never filled, and was classified as Unable to Fill, or UTF. There were only 12 heavy air tankers on duty June 30 in the lower 48 states and none were available to respond to the fatal fire near southwest of Prescott, Arizona.
The Granite Mountain Hotshots lost 19 of their 20 crewpersons that day when a passing thunderstorm caused the wind to change direction by 180 degrees and increase in speed, gusting to over 40 mph. In winds that strong it is unlikely that any aircraft could operate safely 200 feet above the ground or effectively drop a liquid that would accurately hit the intended target.
The last retardant drops before the fatal entrapment were made at 12:30 and 1 p.m. by P2V air tankers which carry a maximum of 2,082 gallons. After that the air tankers went back to another fire they had been working in northern Arizona. According to the AP, earlier the two DC-10 very large air tankers had been requested which drop 11,600 gallons each, but they were not available. The AP also said, “Only a spotter plane was in the air when the Prescott, Ariz.-based Granite Mountain Hotshots died. The state’s fleet of small single-engine retardant-dropping planes was grounded in Prescott because of the weather, and no helicopters or heavy tankers were available.”
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In 2002 there were 44 large or heavy air tankers on exclusive use contracts. Today there are 9. The day the 19 Hotshots died, four military MAFFS air tankers had been activated days earllier, but of those potential 13 air tankers, some of them would have been on their day off. And some, or all of those on duty, would have been actively working other fires. There were 50 uncontained large fires in the United States that day. If they all needed air tankers, which is not likely, each of the 12 that were on duty (according to the AP) would have to be shared by 4 large fires.
In 2012 about half the requests for air tankers could not be filled according to data from the National Interagency Fire Center. Of the 914 requests, 438 were rejected as “unable to fill” (UTF), meaning no air tankers were available to respond to the fire; 67 were cancelled for various reasons.
New data that the National Interagency Fire Center released about the 2012 wildfire season reveals that almost half, or 48 percent, of the requests for large air tankers could not be filled. Of the 914 requests, 438 were rejected as “unable to fill” (UTF), meaning no air tankers were available to respond to the fire; 67 were cancelled for various reasons.
New data that the National Interagency Fire Center released about the 2012 wildfire season reveals that almost half, or 48 percent, of the requests for large air tankers could not be filled. Of the 914 requests, 438 were rejected as “unable to fill” (UTF), meaning no air tankers were available to respond to the fire; 67 were cancelled for various reasons. The requests that were filled included 346 for civilian contracted air tankers and 63 for military Modular Airborne FireFighting Systems (MAFFS) C-130s.
For additional perspective, consider that the number of requests for air tankers during the 2000 fire season was higher than the 13-year average between 2000 and 2012 — 548 requests vs. the average of 434, but in 2000 only 7 percent of them were UTF. In 2000 there were 40 large air tankers on exclusive use contracts compared to between 9 and 11 in 2012.
More acres burned in the United States in 2012 than average. At 9.3 million, it was the most since 2007. But the number of fires was surprisingly small, only 67,774 which is the lowest number since 2005.
The average number of fires in the lower 49 states each year is gradually decreasing, but the average size is increasing rapidly. This could be due to a number of factors, including climate, increased fuel loading (vegetation), reduced budgets, fewer firefighters, and not as many air tankers.
One of the reasons the U.S. Forest Service has allowed the air tanker fleet to atrophy may be a misguided attempt to save money. Fast, aggressive, initial attack on new fires can reduce the number of megafires that may burn hundreds of homes while costing the taxpayers tens of millions of dollars in suppression costs alone. The 2002 Federal Aerial Firefighting Report, usually known as the “Blue Ribbon Panel Report”, addressed this issue:
While cost-saving is an essential contracting criterion, it appears to have displaced other, less-quantifiable criteria that call for more judgment and experience, such as value, safety records, and past performance. Pilots have sarcastically referred to this cost-focus philosophy as “budget protection” rather than “fire protection.” In contrast, a Canadian philosophy states, “We can’t spend too much the first day [of a fire],” seems to justify spending money on early containment of a fire, and doing so in an operationally effective way that minimizes the number of escaped fires. In the long run, the Canadians believe that they spend far less for a quick-response capability designed to contain small fires than they do to fight fires after they grow large.
It has has been 1 year, 2 months, and 24 days since the U.S. Forest Service issued a solicitation for next-generation large air tankers, but no contracts have been awarded.
It takes a while to digest the 49-page report on the July 1 crash of MAFFS #7, the military C-130 air tanker, in which four crew members were killed. Earlier we posted a summary of the report, but here are some additional thoughts.
MAFFS crash, radar at 1733, five minutes before the crash.
The radar image above, 5 minutes before MAFFS #7 impacted the ground at 1738 local time, recorded a very large thunderstorm cell southwest of the crash site. The middle of the concentric circles is the location of the crash. The circles indicate 5, 10, and 15 nautical miles from the impact site. The light green areas may have been virga, rain that was not reaching the ground. The red, light brown, dark green, and possibly the yellow areas were most likely rain, accompanied by strong winds. The longest east-west line is the South Dakota/Nebraska state line. The longest north-south line is the boundary between Wyoming and the states of South Dakota and Nebraska.
In addition to the C-130 working on the fire, there was also a Bureau of Land Management Air Supervision Module aircraft which was flown by a lead plane pilot and also carried an Air Tactical Group Supervisor. It was acting as the lead plane at the time of the accident.
The ASM/Lead experienced a severe downdraft while approaching the intended retardant drop zone with the C130 in trail. This is being investigated by the US Forest Service as a separate Incident With Potential.
The third fixed wing aircraft to arrive at the White Draw fire that was mentioned in the report served as Air Attack. It was piloted from the left seat by Air Attack 3 (AA3 in the report), and in the right seat was the Air Tactical Group Supervisor. Both were employed by the State of South Dakota.
Before the crash, the air attack aircraft encountered sudden updrafts and downdrafts with airspeed fluctuations between 20 to 40 knots, which forced the aircraft into bank angles of approximately 90 degrees.
Here are some interesting passages from the report that discuss the weather conditions:
At 17:38:18L, MP1 ordered an e-dump of the retardant, which was immediately conducted. At the same time, Firefighter 1 (FF1) a ground firefighter, was located approximately 1.5 miles west-southwest of the future mishap site. FF1 witnessed the MA [mishap aircraft] jettison their retardant load, at which time she experienced variable surface winds with estimated gusts up to 50 miles per hour. At the same time, in Air Attack, ATGS observed the smoke lying down and “sheeting” of the fire, indicating to him “hellacious” surface winds. ATGS and AA3 lost altitude, experienced updrafts and downdrafts with airspeed fluctuations of 20 to 40 KIAS and severe turbulence. Air Attack lost an estimated 1,000 ft due to the weather conditions. ATGS did not see the MA jettison the retardant load.
Between 1730L and 1745L, Incident Commander 1 (IC1), a member of the Army National Guard, was traveling on a motorcycle, southbound on Highway 18 approximately seven miles north of Edgemont attempting to get to an 1800L meeting at the White Draw Fire incident command center in Edgemont, South Dakota. While heading towards Edgemont, IC1 witnessed the MA flying to his right, approximately one mile away, making a bank as the MA prepared for their approach to the drop area. IC1 lost sight of the MA while going down the hill towards Edgemont, at that same instant, IC1 was “hit with this extreme, fierce wind”. IC1 described it as side wind because it “pushed me over to the other side of the highway”.
The MAFFS crew received a briefing on the weather for the Arapahoe fire they dropped on earlier in Wyoming, but they did not have any specific weather information on the weather for the White Draw fire in southwest South Dakota and no update was requested when they were diverted to that fire.
From the report:
On 1 July 2012 at 1650L, the National Weather Service issued a severe thunderstorm watch for northeast Wyoming and western South Dakota encompassing the area surrounding Edgemont, South Dakota and the White Draw Fire. The severe thunderstorm watch, valid from 1650L to 2300L, was issued for potential hail up to two inches in diameter and wind gusts up to 70 miles per hour. However, there was no evidence the MC requested or received forecast weather information for South Dakota or the White Draw Fire area at any time on 1 July 2012.
After dropping on the Arapahoe fire in Wyoming, the MAFFS was dispatched to the Highlands fire west of Custer, South Dakota. But en route they were diverted to the White Draw Fire which was 24 miles southeast of the Highlands Fire.
At that time I was taking photos at the Highlands Fire and the Oil Creek Fire, the latter being farther west across the state line near Newcastle, Wyoming. Between 1730 and 1830 I remember seeing massive, very dark thunderstorm clouds to my southeast. The photo below taken at 1715 is looking south toward the Highlands Fire. In the background the dark clouds farther south can be seen.
Highlands Fire, 1715 MT, July 1, 2012. Photo by Bill Gabbert
From 1630 until 1645 a Canadian “Bird Dog” and a CV-540 were over the Highlands fire. They were asked to drop, but refused, saying there were too many people on the ground in the intended drop area. It would be interesting to know where they went after being released from that fire, or if the weather affected the decision about their destination.
CV-540, T44, over Highlands Fire, at 1708 MT, July 1, 2012. Photo by Bill Gabbert
The MAFFS has a capacity of 3,000 gallons, but each time MAFFS #7 reloaded that day they refilled with less retardant. At the White Draw fire it was only carrying 2,346 gallons which it split into two drops on the fire.
Crew rest or fatigue were not issues, according to the report.
Regarding the radio transmissions from the lead plane pilot saying “I got to go around” after encountering the downdraft and coming within 10 feet of the ground, and a few seconds later calmly advising the MAFFS to “drop your load when you can”, (meaning an emergency release of retardant to lighten the load, enabling the aircraft to more easily maneuver) the report said:
MAFFS aircrew members attested that a call for a go around is most commonly heard regarding misalignments for drops rather than urgent situations. It is possible that [the lead plane’s] call for a go around while meant to abort the mishap drop, was not interpreted by the [MAFFS Crew] as significantly urgent, based on their prior experience.
According to the report the overall flying experience of the MAFFS crew was high.
However [the pilot, the aircraft commander] had limited experience as a MAFFS aircraft commander and [the navigator] was participating in his first MAFFS mission. [The pilot] was a current and qualified Senior Pilot with over 1,900 total C-130 hours, however prior to the day of the mishap he had accomplished only seven drops as a MAFFS copilot and zero drops as a MAFFS aircraft commander.
The second pilot was more experienced with MAFFS and served as a MAFFS instructor pilot for this sortie.
The emergency locator transmitter (ELT) failed to activate when the C-130 crashed. One of the survivors called 911 on his cell phone and reported the crash but he said he didn’t know where he was.
The flight data recorder for the C-130 was found and shipped to the Air Force Safety Center for data retrieval and analysis. The report said the last 12.8 hours of data on the device were corrupt and unusable for investigation purposes.
There was no evidence that aircraft weight or the MAFFS unit in the cargo hold were factors in the crash. “Prior to the mishap, the MAFFS unit was operating at 100 percent capability and an emergency dump was successfully completed.”
About 34 minutes after the crash, firefighting helicopter crews assigned to the fire that were on the ground at the nearby Edgemont Municipal Airport were notified about the crash. But they were unable to fly at that time due to heavy rain, gusty winds, and a low ceiling. While waiting, an EMT loaded medical equipment on N935CH, call sign 5CH.
At the time of the crash the air attack ship was at 1,500 feet above the ground and following the MAFFS aircraft, observing the drop. On that pass the air attack ship had their hands full, experiencing extreme turbulence which resulted in bank angles of approximately 90 degrees. After the crash it had to leave the area due to the strong turbulence and the approaching thunderstorm. It loitered at a safe distance for about 30 minutes before it was able to access the area again, after which it led one of the fire’s helicopters, H-535, to the site.
During the last pass, the lead plane over-temped (or “smoked”) the aircraft engines while attempting to recover from being pushed down to within 10 feet of the ground and had to go to the Rapid City Airport.
When the weather improved, the two helicopters, N911FS, call sign H-535 (from the San Bernardino National Forest in southern California), and 5CH, departed and proceeded toward the mishap site. When they landed at the site at approximately 1850, the EMT on 5CH met the survivor who was still talking to the 911 operator on his cell phone. The EMT assessed and began treating him while the other helicopter crewmembers searched for other survivors, eventually finding the second survivor “wandering near the mishap site”. Helicopter 5CH transported both survivors to the Custer Airport, about 10 minutes away. One of them was then flown by an emergency medical helicopter to Rapid City while the other went by ground ambulance to a hospital.
As Wildfire Today reported on September 17, the pilot and at least two crewmembers of H-535 were given awards for their actions related to the crash. It is possible that others involved in the emergency response to the incident also received awards.
Firefighters Daniel Diaz (center), Kevin Walters (left), and pilot Chuck MacFarland (right) receive their awards for their actions following the crash of MAFFS 7. Photo credit: San Bernardino National Forestx
The number of unfilled orders for large air tankers increased to 29.8 percent in 2011, while the number of air tankers that were available on contract fell. In 2010 there were 19 large air tankers on exclusive use contracts and the unable to fill (UTF) rate was 15 percent.
The higher UTF rate is at least partially due to a busy fire season in the southwest, compared to the slower years of 2009 and 2010. The number of acres burned in the lower 49 states in 2011, which excludes Alaska, was 8.4 million, exceeding the average of 5.1 million between 2000 and 2011.
Acres burned in wildfires in lower 49 states, US 2000-2011. Data from NIFC.
While the data about UTF rates is difficult to interpret, perhaps we can be safe in saying that if more than 4,000,000 acres burn in the lower 49 states, having 21 or fewer large air tankers tends to result in 25-30% of the air tanker orders being UTF, which is about triple the UTF rate when fewer acres burn. In 2000 with 40 air tankers on contract, 6,600,000 acres burned, and the UTF rate was 7%.
You have to wonder how often incident commanders do not place orders for needed air tankers if they already know that none are available.
UPDATE at 9:00 p.m. MT, January 25, 2012:
We received an email from Scott and we asked him if we could post what he wrote. Here it is:
You wrote “You have to wonder how often incident commanders do not place orders for needed air tankers if they already know that none are available.” This statement is hauntingly similiar to those found in John McLean’s “Fire on the Mountain”, where the author reported airtankers were not ordered during early phase of South Canyon Fire because of assumption “none were available”. The Lesson Learned was don’t assume. Place the orders, justify the need, and push for priority. Still may not get AT, but you tried. Obviously, the reduction in total number AT is ominous for the future. Thanks for keeping it on the front burner.
