As Florida fires were peaking in early April I was texting a colleague, Jon Freeman, for updates. I first got to know Jon when he was a fire effects monitor and wildland fire module member and lead. Now his work has taken him to air tactical group supervisor (ATGS), or simply Air Attack – and his recent assignments took him to south Florida. A few texts and shared photos later, it became clear that Florida is a landscape, like so many, where the stories of unwanted hazardous flames burn along side (and sometimes into) the good work of planned fire.
As Jon texted, “It was pretty amazing to watch the head of a large wildfire roll right into this recent Rx fire and basically go out. It threw spots into it that smoldered and put themselves out quickly. So cool.”
He’d preceded his observations with a few photo stories … with these photographs by Michael Gue, prescribed fire manager with the South Florida National Parks and Preserve, as seen at work with a camera and in his photos, documenting his team’s artful fire work. The photos are of the head of the Cypress Camp Trail Fire, stopped by the Perocchi prescribed burn which, as Jon said, demonstrates “the power of Rx treatments.”
Aerial view of wildfire stopped by effects of prescribed fire. Photo: Michael Gue.
Prescribed fire with reduced fuels and post-fire green up helped stop the forward progression of the wildfire (on the right). Photo: Michael Gue.
The wildire on one side, stopped as it burned into a fuel-reducing prescribed fire on the right side of the road, where the plants are already greening up. Photo: Michael Gue.
Michael Gue, prescribed fire manager with the South Florida National Parks and Preserve. Photo: Jon Freeman.
The story is amazing, as are the photos … and the story and photos continue from Jon’s perspective, including a few of his images taken while doing the work of the day, with a smart phone.
The Kent Fire in the wildand-urban interface of Bonita Springs. Though structures burned, an interagency response – federal, state and county – combined to minimize losses. Photo: Jon Freeman.
“This is the Cypress Camp Trail Fire, in Big Cypress National Preserve. Burning out in Division B with a combination of UAS and hand ignition .” Words/photo: Jon Freeman.
Example of aerial and ground ignitions on the Copeland prescribed burn in Big Cypress National Preserve. Jon was in Helicopter 626, the park’s Bell 206, as an aerial supervision platform. Photo: Jon Freeman.
Aerial and ground ignitions on the Copeland prescribed burn in Big Cypress National Preserve. Photo: Jon Freeman.
And what’s a photo story without an end of shift sunset.
Oasis Helibase in February 2022, when Jon was in Big Cypress NP, doing the same sort of work as this year. Photo: Jon Freeman.
Even though we’re filled with such a range of social sharing, it’s not always the case that we can scan the breadth and depth of fire experience at once … to see and reflect on a month of fire, planned and unplanned, and what happens where they join. Thanks for sharing to Michael and Jon.
While fire activity moderated with mid-April precipitation, fire season does continue in Florida. In Big Cypress National Preserve, the Sandy Fire has grown to 10,000 acres since its discovery on May 1.
#SandyFire#FLFire#FLBCPhttps://t.co/KTJFi9y84v Sandy Fire: The Sandy Fire, located with Big Cypress National Preserve, was discovered on May 1 and is burning in pines, grass, palmetto and cypress. Closures have been implemented for all areas west of 11 Mile Rd, north of US41, east of Monument Trail, and south of Mud Lake, Little Deer, Oasis Trail and Lost Dog.
File photo of drone being used for the first time to ignite a prescribed fire at Homestead National Monument, April 22, 2016. Photo by Bill Gabbert.
April 22, 2016 was the first time that a drone, or Unmanned Aerial System, was used to intentionally ignite a managed fire. The University of Nebraska tested a system that had been under development, using it to ignite a portion of a prescribed fire at Homestead National Monument west of Beatrice, Nebraska. As a proof of concept, it was considered a success. The drone dropped plastic spheres which burst into flame about half a minute after landing on the ground, similar to the ones dropped by helicopters for aerial ignition on large wildfires and prescribed fires.
Using the technology developed by the University of Nebraska, drones are being used to help firefighters conduct firing operations on the Klondike Fire about 25 miles southwest of Grants Pass, Oregon.
Daily updates released by the incident management team between August 8 and 13, 2018 documented the use of the drones for lighting strategic fires to even out and increase the depth of burned areas adjacent to fire lines in difficult terrain where firefighter safety could be compromised. Firefighters say drone technology used on the Klondike Fire has enabled aerial observation and firing operations to continue during smoky conditions, which aids fire containment and completion of contingency lines.
The video below from the Mail Tribune has an interview with Steve Stroud, fleet manager with the Office of Aviation Services, explaining how the aircraft is used. An article at the site has more information.
The next video was filmed in 2016 at the first test of a drone to ignite a prescribed fire.
Thanks and a tip of the hat go out to Kelly. Typos or errors, report them HERE.
File photo of the drone used at the 2016 test at Homestead National Monument. Photo by Bill Gabbert.
Thanks and a tip of the hat go out to Kelly. Typos or errors, report them HERE.
One person was seriously injured in the 2015 crash. The pilot and a USFS employee were killed.
The U.S. Forest Service has released a 90-page “Learning Review” about the March 30, 2015 crash of a helicopter that occurred during prescribed fire operations on a National Forest in Mississippi approximately 20 miles north of Gulfport. The accident took the lives of Forest Service employee Steve Cobb, contract pilot Brandon Ricks, and seriously injured another Forest Service employee on detail from Montana.
The helicopter was igniting a prescribed fire by using a plastic sphere dispenser (PSD), a device that drops small balls that burst into flame after they land on the ground. Steve Cobb was serving as the Firing Boss [FIRB] and the detailed employee was operating the PSD out of the right-rear door. The helicopter that crashed was N50KH, a Bell 206-L.
According to the pilot’s personal flight logbooks, he had accumulated 6,471 total hours of flight experience, about 6,300 hours of which were in the accident helicopter make and model. The owner estimated that the pilot had accrued 22 additional flight hours in the 90 days that preceded the accident.
Before the flight the engine on the helicopter failed to start on the first try, but the second attempt was successful. Later over the prescribed fire the aircraft made about 12 passes over the project and had been flying for about an hour when the crash occurred.
Below is an excerpt from the USFS report:
The PSD operator recalled they “were flying along 25-to-30 feet above the highest tree…things were going really well,” and they were nearly through the first bag of balls when he heard two alarm warning buzzers go off simultaneously or nearly so followed immediately by the pilot stating, “We lost power,” and FIRB saying, “We’re going in; we’re going in.”
The PSD operator swung his right leg over the PSD machine and back inside the helicopter, just as he had practiced in his head when he envisioned this scenario. He didn’t want his leg broken or trapped under the helicopter if it were to roll on its side. As he tightened his lap belt and pushed his back against the seat, hands on his knees in the crash position, he felt the helicopter tip backwards and to the right slightly. The PSD operator believed the pilot initiated this position purposefully, possibly as part of an autorotation. The descent through the tree canopy was not violent, and the helicopter slipped through the trees tail first. The impact with the ground was “abrupt.” The PSD operator felt the lap belt catch him; the impact knocked the wind out of him.
The PSD operator remembers the helicopter coming to rest more or less upright, and it was quiet. The PSD operator could hear breathing over the intercom system and “crackling” as the balls they had just dropped began to establish fire. He thought to himself, “I’m still alive!” He unbuckled the lap belt and unhooked the gunner strap’s tether from the helicopter, then reached forward to jostle the pilot, yelling at the pilot and FIRB, “We gotta get outta here.” He exited the helicopter from the right side and once on the ground, moved towards the front of the aircraft. He yelled again, “We gotta go,” calling each by name while realizing they were unconscious and that he wouldn’t be able to move them with his injuries. As it was, he was having difficulty breathing and standing up. He now heard the roar of the fire that had grown from small individual spots of fire to a wall of flames surrounding them; he knew it was time to move.
He turned and faced the wall of flames and thought, “I just survived a helicopter crash; I am going to live.” He recounted, “I started walking, through the wall of flames 10-to-15 feet thick, then all the glowing ashes on the other side and residual heat…hands over my face and screaming into my hands and saying, ‘Don’t fall, don’t fall’…everything was glowing and I just kept going…I could feel myself burning…the watchband melting on my wrist.” The PSD operator walked approximately 900 feet in a westerly direction to reach the 415A road and the western edge of the burn unit sometime between 1448 and 1451.
After a while he was found by firefighters and was eventually transported by ground ambulance to a waiting air ambulance which flew him to the University of Southern Alabama Hospital in Mobile, Alabama. His injuries included fractures of two cervical and two lumbar vertebrae, left ocular and left side ribs; and intestinal and hernia tears.
The National Transportation Safety Board concluded the helicopter experienced a “loss of engine power for reasons that could not be determined”. The helicopter did not catch fire when it hit the ground, but it was soon ignited by the spreading prescribed fire, hampering the NTSB investigation.
The USFS Learning Review emphasized several issues related to the accident — not necessarily causes, but items for discussion. One was the decision to ignite the project from a helicopter rather than from the ground.
The primary purpose for utilizing helicopters for aerial ignition in this region is to mitigate the exposure of ground resources to the hazards of hand-lighting units. For Unit 1459, like most units on the De Soto Ranger District, a combination of the vegetation, terrain, and fire behavior make hand-lighting units inefficient and hazardous. Flame lengths of greater than four feet combined with difficult walking conditions raise a red flag for a burn boss concerning firefighter safety. Plants such as palmetto (Serenoa repens), gallberry (Llex spp.), ti-ti (Cyrilla racemiflora), and smilax (Smilax spp.) when combined with needles from longleaf, slash, and Loblolly pines can create flame lengths in excess of 10 feet with as little as a two-to-three year accumulation of dead material. These species are also very difficult to traverse. Smilax vines can ensnare firefighters and drip torches and stop them in their tracks. This area also still has some large dead fuel concentrations as a result of Hurricane Katrina. In these areas people working in the woods may encounter downed timber that can stop heavy equipment from forward progress.
Using an airborne resource for igniting a fire rather than personnel on the ground does not eliminate risk. It transfers it.
Another issue was the required flight characteristics of a helicopter while igniting a fire with a PSD. An air tanker when dropping retardant has to fly low and slow to be effective. Similarly, with the current versions of the PSD, a helicopter’s recommended speed should not exceed 50 mph (43 knots), while the preferred altitude is 300 feet above ground level (AGL).
Hovering out of ground effect (HOGE) is the typical flight profile.
The last data from the helicopter provided by the Automated Flight Following (AFF) before the crash indicated it was at 132 feet AGL and traveling at 43 knots.
From the report:
It is clear how organizational processes influenced the acceptance of risk. As a result, risk assessments did not consider the flight profile, as it was already determined that low/slow was necessary in order to accomplish the work. The fact that the recommendations for airspeed and altitude were heavily influenced by the capability of the PSD likely influenced a gradual decay over time of the options and decision space for the pilot to maintain optimal combinations of airspeed and altitude. The fact that this is a successful tool available for conducting prescribed burn operations, sets the stage to “justify” its use, rather than to prompt the agency to look at better options or technology.
The acknowledgement of these flight conditions in agency guides likely affects the deliberate acceptance of a “low and slow” profile as necessary for the accomplishment of the mission. A low/slow flight profile makes sense because it is suggested within written procedure. Over a period of time (4+ decades), confidence and acceptability of the flight parameters strengthens with each successful mission, along with a slight departure from the awareness of the hazards associated with the flight profiles. This is a demonstration of how the production goals creep into mission planning to dominate the protection goals without recognition of such. In this case, all required policy was followed and personnel were conducting their work within the operational norms set up by agency policy and culture.
The Learning Review has numerous recommendations, including modifying the existing PSD machines to enable the helicopter to fly higher and faster. Another is to invent an entirely new method of aerial ignition in order to mitigate the low and slow flight profile.
Homestead National Monument expects to ignite a prescribed fire using an unmanned aerial system, or drone.
Above: University of Nebraska-Lincoln researchers Dirac Twidwell, left, Sebastian Elbaum, and Carrick Detweiler with their unmanned aerial system for supporting prescribed burns. Elbaum and Detweiler are professor and assistant professor of computer science and engineering, respectively. Twidwell is an assistant professor and rangeland ecologist in UNL’s School of Natural Resources. Photo by Craig Chandler / University Communications.
The prescribed fire at Homestead National Monument four miles west of Beatrice, Nebraska will include a live test of a University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL) small Unmanned Aircraft System (sUAS). The UNL system is a greatly scaled down version of a manned helicopter aerial ignition device. A multidisciplinary team of UNL experts in micro-UAS technology, fire ecology, conservation and public policy is developing this unmanned aerial system for supporting prescribed and wildland fire operations. We first wrote about their fire-igniting drone at Fire Aviation in October, 2015.
The park has received all of the approvals necessary to use the drone on this project, including the NPS Regional Office, their Washington office, and the Federal Aviation Administration.
Jim Traub, National Park Service (NPS) Unmanned Aircraft System Specialist, said:
UAS’s in firefighting have the potential to reduce direct risk to firefighters doing ignition work while reducing costs and making an aerial resource more widely accessible to wildland firefighting efforts. The National Park Service is pleased to facilitate this unique and innovative opportunity with UNL, for this test of a sUAS in a fire situation.
Homestead National Monument of America, the NPS Midwest Region Fire and Aviation Program, and the NPS National Aviation Offices are collaborating with UNL’s Nebraska Intelligent Mobile Unmanned Systems (NIMBUS) Laboratory and the Department of Interior Office of Aviation Services (OAS) for this operational test and evaluation of the integration of sUAS into wildland fire operations. The goal with the Homestead Prescribed Fire is to conduct a live test of the sUAS consistent with the intent of 2015 UAS Technology Overview approved by then NPS Associate Director of Visitor Resource Protection, Cam Sholly; Department of Interior Deputy Assistant Secretary, Kim Thorsen; and Office of Aviation Services, Director Mark Bathrick.
Their system uses the same principle for the ignition source as the much larger devices used in full sized helicopters — plastic sphere dispensers. The spheres look like ping pong balls, but they are manufactured with a chemical inside. When the dispenser injects a second chemical into the ball it creates an exothermic reaction causing it to burst into flame about half a minute later after it has been ejected from the machine. When the helicopter, manned or unmanned, drops the spheres, they can ignite any receptive fuels on the ground about 25 to 40 seconds later.
Now that Homestead National Monument has all of the plans and approvals in hand, they are just waiting for a weather window that meets the criteria in their prescribed fire plan. They hope to get it done before May 15 of this year.
I asked the park Superintendent, Mark Engler, if he was worried that the drone might drop a sphere outside the prepared control lines:
No, I know we have to be alert that that could happen, but we have already put in a fireline, and we made it extra wide this time. We took an extra step and actually removed the cut grass [from the line after it was mowed]. We think the risk here is very low. And because the risk is so low, we feel that this is an appropriate place to conduct this test.
The park has been using fire for years to help maintain and restore their tall grass prairie. They have identified a 26-acre unit for this particular project. Homestead first started using prescribed fire in the 1980s. Mr. Engler said they have the “oldest restored prairie in the National Park Service”.
The plans call for 15 people to be actively involved in the burn, plus the crew operating the unmanned aerial system.
Forestry operations officer Bob Knox takes the controls of the fire dragon from Forestry officer Doug Johnson. Picture: NEIL RICHARDSON (click to enlarge)
I ran across this photo that accompanied an article in The Examiner about a prescribed fire in Tasmania, Australia. The caption is as it appeared in the article. Can anyone explain what a “fire dragon” is? I’m thinking it must be an aerial ignition device, but I’m wondering why the helicopter is hovering instead of landing in order to apparently transfer a hand-held device between the two people in the photo.
