Above: MQ-1 Predator unmanned aircraft. (U.S. Air Force photo/Lt Col Leslie Pratt)
A decision by the U.S. Air Force to retire an aircraft could help the U.S. Forest Service and other wildland fire agencies provide a safer working environment for their firefighters.
The Air Force will stop flying their MQ-1 Predator drones as early as July 1 of this year as they completely transition to the much more capable MQ-9 Reaper. The MQ-1 was never designed to carry weapons since it was built with a payload capacity of only 200 pounds. Eventually some of the aircraft had their wings and hard points beefed up and were able to carry various combinations of Hellfire, Stinger, and Griffin missiles.
The replacement, the MQ-9, can carry up to 4,000 pounds of both missiles and bombs.
A long-endurance drone orbiting over a wildland fire for up to 24 hours at a time would help provide an often missing and very important piece of situation awareness information — the real time location of the fire and the location of personnel and equipment. We call this the Holy Grail of Wildland Firefighter Safety.
Using its true color and infrared sensors it could help fireline supervisors make decisions about where to deploy, and more importantly not deploy, firefighters based on their view of exactly where the fire is, the intensity, and the rate of spread. Too many firefighters have perished in part because they were not aware of where the fire was in relation to their location.
Drones have been used before on wildland fires. In 2008 and again in 2009 NASA made available their Ikhana Predator B UAV.
And in 2013 we wrote:
The California National Guard is operating a Predator unmanned aerial vehicle over the Rim Fire in Yosemite National Park. The MQ-1 Predator is streaming real-time video down to the Incident Command Post and reportedly alerted firefighters to a flare-up they otherwise would not have immediately seen.
A drone orbiting over a fire could also serve as a radio repeater and provide an aerial hub for a network of location trackers carried by firefighters which would enable icons representing their real time locations to be shown on maps.
In recent years the US Forest Service has shown a willingness to utilize discarded military aircraft, such as the Sherpa and the HC-130H.
Thanks and a tip of the hat go out to Bean.
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Sounds good. Who will fly them? Who maintains them? Will they interfere with Air Tanker and other air operations?
How much will they cost to operate and maintain?
This is an idea that I’ve been considering for some time, and I’m happy to see others give it their support. Add in a cellular telephone repeater, and give everyone on the fire phone and network access.
No drones for the forest service until they can prove that they can manage their C-130 fleet. Sure it has potential but those sensor packs can be put on regular aircraft and flown by pilots with sensor operators on board and still do the same job. Region 5 has been doing that with the cobras for a while now, only problem is that they can’t stay on station for a very long time and there are only 2.