Forest Service evaluating two high altitude drones to assist wildland firefighters

Thunderhead Stratospheric balloon can assist wildland firefighters
Illustration of how a Thunderhead Stratospheric balloon can assist wildland firefighters.

The US Forest Service is partnering with NASA to evaluate the use of two high-altitude long endurance drones to improve wildland firefighters’ situational awareness.

1. A balloon

Last week a balloon laden with a sophisticated package of electronics hovered 60,000 feet over the Moose Fire in Idaho. Its mission was to assist firefighters in improving and maintaining situational awareness. Some of them may have seen the shiny object the size of a football stadium, even though it was more than 11 miles above the incident.

The company that built and operates the aircraft, Aerostar, calls it STRATO, or Strategic Radio and Tactical Overwatch, a technology that is in the research and development phase.

Raven Aerostar balloon
File photo of a partially inflated Raven Aerostar balloon just after launch. Still image from Aerostar video.

The STRATO is basically a giant mylar balloon with solar panels, batteries, radio equipment, cameras, and sensors. It has the capability to collect infrared and visual data, broadcast an LTE (cell phone) signal, has a high-band radio that can enable push to talk communications, and can operate a WiFi network. The huge helium balloon can hover over an incident in the stratosphere taking pictures, delivering data to incident managers, and providing communications options to the Incident Command Post and crews on the ground.

Aerostar Thunderhead Stratospheric balloon Moose Fire
Flight path of an Aerostar Thunderhead Stratospheric balloon over the Moose Fire the week of August 7, 2022.

Last October Fire Aviation wrote about the system operated by Aerostar, a company based near Sioux Falls, South Dakota, which has been working with lighter than air technologies since 1956. We contacted the Communications Manager for the company, Lisa McElrath, who told us that in June, July, and August of 2021 they launched one of their Thunderhead Balloons from South Dakota and flew it west to monitor wildfires. While traveling more than 16,000 miles during its 70-day flight it engaged in station-seeking above four active fires for the company’s research and development.  It collected visible and thermal imagery data for extended periods of time on the Robertson Draw Fire (Montana), the Dixie Fire (California), the Dixie-Jumbo Fire (Idaho), and the Dry Gulch/Lick Creek Fire (Washington).

In October we asked Ms. McElrath if Aerostar had been cooperating with the federal land management agencies in mapping fires. She said not yet, but that representatives from the National Interagency Fire Center had reached out to them and expressed interest in discussions after the fire season slowed down. But this year the US Forest Service is officially cooperating in the pilot project.

“We can provide real-time imagery from the balloon today in the visible and infrared,” Ms. McElrath said. “In the future, the goal would be to automate the detection and download of critical imagery, fire perimeters, likely fire-starts, and other key information via onboard processing so that more actionable information would be available. We see stratospheric balloon technology being the key to cost-effective, scalable wildfire surveillance that reduces time between new fire detection and response. Effectively, balloons can alert firefighters to a new fire while it is still small, before the fire grows into something newsworthy and very expensive.”

She said the balloons can also serve as radio repeaters for personnel on the ground and could collect information from tracking devices on firefighting resources which could then be displayed on a map.

More flights over fires are being planned, said Sean Triplett, Team Lead for Tools and Technology, U.S. Forest Service, Fire and Aviation Management. He said NASA is matching the funding the Forest Service is putting toward the flights this year.

2. Fixed wing aircraft

Swift Engineering's SULE HALE-UAS
Swift Engineering’s SULE HALE-UAS. Swift Engineering photo.

Another High Altitude Long Endurance (HALE) aircraft the Forest Service is looking at is Swift Engineering’s SULE HALE-UAS, capable of staying aloft for more than 30 days at a time. The Forest Service, again partnering with NASA, has issued a contract with the company and as of March 31, 2021 they had conducted more than 10 demonstrations of the solar powered fixed wing aircraft.

The key to long duration flight using solar power on an airplane is to have a top surface area large enough for the solar cells needed to power the electric motors day and night, using a battery for night operations. Large wings mean more solar cells, but also more wind resistance. So the answer, using today’s technology, is to fly very high at 60,000 to 70,000 feet where the air is thin, the sunlight on the solar panels is strong, and there is less wind resistance.

The SULE, which took its first flight in July of 2020 has a 72-foot wingspan, operates at 70,000 feet, and can carry a payload of 15 to 22 pounds.

“A series of mid-altitude and high-altitude flights is being undertaken, Mr. Triplett told Fire Aviation on Wednesday. “At this point, the platform is only providing remote sensing products. However, if successful, additional systems may be incorporated.” Those added systems could include a radio system to provide connectivity enabling the tracking of firefighting resources on the ground in addition to live imagery of the fire.

Mr. Triplett said one advantage of having NASA as part of the project is that they can handle the airworthiness of the aircraft and interactions with the FAA.

The Swift Engineering video below shows what may be the first flight of the SULE two years ago.

A step toward the Holy Grail of Wildland Firefighter Safety?

Our view is that providing to wildland fire supervisors the real time location of both the fire and firefighting resources is the Holy Grail of Wildland Firefighting Safety. Lacking this information has led to at least two dozen firefighter fatalities. These High Altitude Long Endurance aircraft 13 miles above the fire could be an important link to transmit live video of the fire to personnel and provide radio connectivity enabling the tracking of firefighting resources on the ground even when they are in steep rugged topography. Of course the resources would need to have the hardware necessary to transmit the coordinates of their locations.

The John D. Dingell, Jr. Conservation, Management, and Recreation Act which became law March 12, 2019 required that by March 12, 2021 the five federal land management agencies “…develop consistent protocols and plans for the use on wildland fires of unmanned aircraft system technologies, including for the development of real-time maps of the location of wildland fires.”

While this technology has been demonstrated, real time mapping appears to be far from being used routinely, at least within the Federal agencies. But at the state level, the Governor of California has requested $30 million in their next budget for 31 positions and funds for the state’s Office of Emergency Services to operate Real-Time Intelligence System (FIRIS) aircraft that have shown that they can provide real time fire mapping information. A pilot program for FIRIS first got off the ground September 1, 2019 thanks to funding secured in the 2019-2020 California state budget. This year two FIRIS ships have been assisting firefighters.

FIRIS

The Dingell Act also mandated that the five federal land management agencies “jointly develop and operate a tracking system to remotely locate the positions of fire resources for use by wildland firefighters, including, at a minimum, any fire resources assigned to Federal type 1 wildland fire incident management teams”, again, due by March 12, 2021.

Other solar powered high-altitude aircraft

An aircraft that the Forest Service is not involved with is the Zephyr, made by AIRBUS. It is an unmanned, solar-powered fixed wing aircraft designed to stay aloft at high altitude for months.

AIRBUS Zephyr
AIRBUS Zephyr, stratospheric unmanned aerial vehicle. Airbus image.

In its latest test flight that began June 15, 2022 the Zephyr took off from the U.S. Army’s Yuma, Arizona Proving Ground and has been flying patterns over the Yuma Test Range and Kofa National Wildlife Refuge ever since. Now 63 days later the flight has smashed Zephyr’s previous record of 25 days that it set in August 2018. When we checked August 17 it was cruising at 40 knots ground speed 70,500 feet above the Earth.

Flight path of ZULU82 Zephyr
Flight path of ZULU82 Zephyr, a solar-powered unmanned aircraft on August 16, 2022, day 62 of a flight that began June 15, 2022.

UPDATE at 7:32 p.m. MDT August 21, 2022

The flight of the Zephyr has ended.

“Following 64 days of stratospheric flight and the completion of numerous mission objectives, Zephyr experienced circumstances that ended its current flight. No personal injury occurred,” AIRBUS said in a statement.

Simple Flying reported that a catastrophic loss of altitude occured on August 19 after flying for 64 days straight:

On its final day of operations, it was tracking around over the vast Arizona Desert, about halfway between Phoenix and Mexicali, Baja California. Flying slightly lower than was typical, at some 45,000 – 50,000 feet, it had completed an S-shape maneuver at around 50 – 60 knots when something went catastrophically wrong. ADSB data shows a vertical descent rate which rapidly increased, topping out at a speed of 4,544 feet per minute. Although unconfirmed by Airbus, it does seem that the Zephyr met a rather unglamorous end.

Zephyr 2021 test flight
The Airbus Zephyr S during a 2021 test flight. US Army photo.

FBI assisting locals to detect drones over wildfires

drone wildland fire
Drone being used to assist wildland firefighters. Drone Amplified photo.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation is using a new system to help wildland firefighters by detecting, identifying, and neutralizing drones that are illegally interfering with firefighting activities.

It is very dangerous to fly a drone near a fire at which helicopters or fixed wing aircraft are operating. A collision could impact the windscreen or damage the engine, props, rotors, or flight control surfaces, causing a crash. If a drone is seen near a fire the standard operating procedure is to remove all aircraft from the fire area until it is confirmed that the drone has left the scene. In other words, it interferes with firefighting efforts.

The FBI is working with the Los Angeles County Fire Department to use a system that can detect a drone flying over a fire within 30 seconds of it being launched.

From CNN:

“When the detection equipment finds the drone and identifies the operator’s location, we can very rapidly get that information to a ground intercept team who can then go make contact with that drone operator and essentially get them to stop flying that drone,” said James Peaco III, the weapons of mass destruction coordinator for the FBI’s Los Angeles field office.

With a special sensor, the team can set up a boundary as large or as small as desired and get notified if a drone flies into that area, instantly obtaining precise details such as elevation, direction, speed as well as where the drone took off from and where the controller is currently standing.

“The first thing we do is order them to bring the drone back, explain to him that there’s a wildfire and flying that drone during a wildland fire is actually a federal felony,” Peaco said.

It’s a federal crime punishable by up to 12 months in prison to interfere with firefighting efforts on public lands. Additionally, Congress has authorized the FAA to impose a civil penalty of up to $20,000 against any drone pilot who interferes with wildfire suppression, law enforcement, or emergency response operations. The FAA treats these violations seriously, and will immediately consider swift enforcement action for these offenses.

According to the US Forest Service, in 2019 at least 20 documented instances of unauthorized drone flights over or near wildfires in seven states (Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah, Washington and Minnesota) resulted in aerial firefighting operations being temporarily shut down nine times. There is no centralized national mechanism to report unauthorized UAS flights over wildfires, so these are only the incidents that wildfire management agencies have become aware of, there are likely more that are not known about.

Suspending air operations could decrease the effectiveness of wildfire suppression operations, allowing wildfires to grow larger, and in some cases, unduly threaten lives, property, and valuable natural and cultural resources. The effects of lost aircraft time could be compounded by flames moving into untreated terrain.

Thanks and a tip of the hat go out to Tom and Gerald.

San Diego County’s Helicopter 10 assists firefighters in Carlsbad

A drone pilot posted aerial video illegally shot of the fire while a helicopter was dropping water

San Diego County Helicopter 10 (N449RC) fire Carlsbad
A San Diego County Bell 205, (N449RC) drops on a fire in Carlsbad, CA June 25, 2022. Photo by Ryan Grothe.

Ryan Grothe got some photos of one of the San Diego County Sheriff Department’s Bell 205 helicopters, H- 10 (N449RC), as it assisted firefighters battling a 10-acre fire in the Buena Vista Lagoon June 25, 2022 near Carlsbad, California between Carlsbad Blvd. and Interstate 5.

Evacuations were in effect for a while but no structures were damaged.

The police arrested and charged David Prosser, a 59-year-old man from Carlsbad, with arson and resisting arrest.

San Diego County Helicopter 10 (N449RC)
San Diego County Helicopter 10 (N449RC) at a fire near Carlsbad Blvd. June 25, 2022. Photo by Ryan Grothe.

A drone was illegally flying near the fire

Within hours after the spread of the fire was stopped, a drone video with aerial footage of the incident was posted on YouTube by New Wave Aerial. The video includes a very clear shot of Helicopter 10 flying  toward the drone at about the same altitude then banking to the left as it maneuvered prior to dropping a load of water on the fire. It is difficult to tell how close the two aircraft were without knowing what type of lens the drone was using, but they may have been just a few hundred feet apart.

New Wave Aerial illegal drone footage fire
Still image from video posted by New Wave Video shot near the fire in Carlsbad, CA June 25, 2022. The helicopter, seen on the right, had just banked to its left after flying toward the drone.

It is very dangerous to fly a drone over a fire at which helicopters or fixed wing aircraft are operating. A collision could impact the windscreen or damage the engine, props, rotors, or flight control surfaces causing a crash. If a drone is seen near a fire the standard operating procedure is to remove all aircraft from the fire area until it is confirmed that the drone has left the scene. In other words, it interferes with firefighting efforts.

Sergeant G. Lanning of the San Diego County Sheriff’s Astrea helicopter division told Fire Aviation that they were not aware that the drone was at the fire. If it had been spotted, it would have shut down the aviation operation at the fire, he said.

Calls to the FAA and New Wave Video were not immediately returned.

The rules

The FAA often implements Temporary Flight Restrictions (TFRs) around wildfires to protect aircraft that are involved in the firefighting operation. All aircraft, including drones, are prohibited from flying in the restricted area unless they’re operated by an agency that’s involved in the firefighting operation. Even if a TFR is not in place, drone pilots should avoid flying near wildfires. It’s a federal crime to interfere with firefighting aircraft regardless of whether restrictions are established, and violators can face stiff penalties.

Fire Traffic Area

It is common on a fire whether or not a TFR is in force, to establish a Fire Traffic Area (FTA) over a fire to provide a standardized initial attack airspace structure and protocol to enhance traffic separation over wildfires. An aircraft should NOT enter the FTA until it receives a clearance. The standard FTA utilizes a minimum 5 nautical mile radius from the incident, although a radius greater than 5 miles may be utilized if needed by the incident.

Penalties

It’s a federal crime punishable by up to 12 months in prison to interfere with firefighting efforts on public lands. Additionally, Congress has authorized the FAA to impose a civil penalty of up to $20,000 against any drone pilot who interferes with wildfire suppression, law enforcement, or emergency response operations. The FAA treats these violations seriously, and will immediately consider swift enforcement action for these offenses.

According to the US Forest Service, in 2019 at least 20 documented instances of unauthorized drone flights over or near wildfires in seven states (Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah, Washington and Minnesota) resulted in aerial firefighting operations being temporarily shut down nine times. There is no centralized national mechanism to report unauthorized UAS flights over wildfires, so these are only the incidents that wildfire management agencies have become aware of, there are likely more that are not known about.

Suspending air operations could decrease the effectiveness of wildfire suppression operations, allowing wildfires to grow larger, and in some cases, unduly threaten lives, property, and valuable natural and cultural resources. The effects of lost aircraft time could be compounded by flames moving into untreated terrain.

drone fires

 

Map, fire in Carlsbad, CA June 25, 2022
Map, fire in Carlsbad, CA June 25, 2022.

Introduction to the drone academy

Drone academy
Still image from the Unmanned Aerial System Aerial Ignition Academy video, which is below.

The Unmanned Aerial System Aerial Ignition Academy trains personnel in the use of drones on prescribed fires and wildfires. The video below is a brief description of the academy.

Interview about aerial ignition with CEO of Drone Amplified

The IGNIS system is used for igniting prescribed fires and burnout operations

drone wildland fire
Drone Amplified photo.

While at the Aerial Firefighting conference in San Diego this week we had a chance to talk with Carrick Detweiler, the CEO and co-founder of Drone Amplified, the developer of the IGNIS prescribed fire system currently being used by land management agencies.

Their system works with American-made drones and takes firefighter risk out of aerial ignition. Two helicopters have crashed while igniting prescribed fires from conventional helicopters, killing a total of three personnel. The incidents occurred in Mississippi in 2015 and Texas in 2019.

We reported in November that Drone Amplified and Parallel Flight Technologies received a $650,000 grant from the US Department of Agriculture to support further development of a large-scale Unmanned Aerial System (UAS) for prescribed fire. Parallel says their hybrid gas/electric UAS can carry 100 pounds for up to two hours, numbers that are much larger than battery operated drones. When paired with the upgraded aerial ignition payload under development which will hold and dispense 3,500 incendiary spheres, it will have eight times the payload carrying capacity of drones being used today, and ten times the flight duration.

Blackhawk helicopter flies for the first time without a pilot on board

UH-60 Blackhawk first autonomous flight
UH-60 Blackhawk in first autonomous flight. February 5, 2022. DARPA photo.

For at least two years Erickson Inc. has been working with Sikorsky and Lockheed Martin to develop a new pilot optional nighttime firefighting solution for helicopters, integrating Sikorsky’s MATRIX Technology into a wildfire suppression system. It would enable the S-64 Air-Crane, which was originally manufactured by Sikorsky, to fight wildland fires during the day or night. Fire Aviation first wrote about this project in February, 2020.

Sikorsky is not limiting this pilot optional capability to the Air-Crane, of course. On February 5 they completed the first of what they occasionally call “uninhabited flight” with a UH-60A Blackhawk. On the runway in Fort Campbell, Kentucky, one of Sikorsky’s pilots in a Blackhawk helicopter flipped the optionally piloted cockpit switch from two to zero, exited the aircraft, and walked across the runway.

Moments later the aircraft, identifiable by DARPA’s logo and tail number N600PV, completed a pre-flight check list, started its engines, spun up its rotors, and took off with no crew onboard. All of it happened fully autonomously.

Equipped with ALIAS (Aircrew Labor In-Cockpit Automation System), the Blackhawk began executing a 30-minute mission. To demonstrate its ability to adapt to a variety of mission environments, the uninhabited BLACK HAWK navigated at typical speed and altitude through a simulated cityscape, avoiding computer-generated buildings while route re-planning in real time.

The BLACK HAWK helicopter then autonomously executed a series of pedal turns, then maneuvered and completed a perfect landing. Once it shut itself down, the two pilots approached and reentered the aircraft. The OPV (optionally-piloted vehicle) switch was reversed from zero to two, and then the pilots taxied back down the runway.

This flight marks the first time that a Blackhawk has flown autonomously. It illustrates how ALIAS-enabled aircraft can help soldiers successfully execute complex missions with selectable levels of autonomy – and, said Lockheed, with increased safety and reliability.

We wrote last March that the helicopter which may be Erickson’s most well known Air-Crane, the one named Elvis, was being gutted down to the studs, so to speak. The company planed to rebuild N179AC as an S-64F+ that could operate without a pilot in the cockpit or autonomously.

"Elvis", an Erickson Air-Crane
“Elvis”, an Erickson Air-Crane. Credit: Erickson

Thanks and a tip of the hat go out to Tom, Rick, and Gerald.

Kaman introduced two new UAV helicopters this year

A medium and a heavy lift helicopter

Kaman KARGO Unmanned Aerial Vehicle
Concept for Kaman KARGO Unmanned Aerial Vehicle. Kaman image.

Since Kaman designed, built, and flew in 1957 the first-ever unmanned helicopter, the company’s interest in unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) has carried over into the 21st century. This year the company introduced two more UAVs, a medium and a heavy lift helicopter.

Between 2001 and 2014 two Kaman K-MAX helicopters converted to UAVs capable of autonomous or remote controlled cargo delivery transported thousands of loads of supplies and equipment to soldiers in Afghanistan. They carried more than 1.5 million pounds of cargo, sometimes through areas that would be considered unacceptably risky for human pilots. Typically operating at night, these unmanned missions replaced the equivalent of 900 convoy vehicles and eliminated 46,000 hours of exposure time to IED’s, direct fire, and other threats to our troops on dangerous roads.

K-MAX Titan Unmanned Aerial System helicopter
First flight of the Kaman TITAN Unmanned Aerial Vehicle helicopter. Kaman image.

Kaman is making a new K-MAX TITAN system which will be available on new production K-MAX helicopters or to retrofit existing K-MAX ships. The system made its initial flight April 21, 2021 of what the company calls the world’s first heavy lift unmanned helicopter for the commercial market. The aircraft can lift up to 6,000 pounds which translates to about 700 gallons of water in an external bucket.

“Kaman leads the way with innovative solutions for our customers that are reliable, affordable and sustainable. K-MAX TITAN is no exception, whether the mission calls for firefighting, humanitarian assistance, or distributed logistics,” stated Darlene Smith, President, Air Vehicles and Precision Products Divisions.

Kaman also has a contract with the U.S. Marine Corps to upgrade the autonomous capabilities of their two USMC K-MAX helicopters.

The other Kaman UAV introduced this year is the KARGO UAV. Built with the U.S. Armed Forces future operating concepts in mind, the KARGO UAV offers a rugged design for easy transport and deployment. The system’s compact form-factor fits in a standard shipping container and is designed to be unloaded and operated by as few as two people.

“The Kaman KARGO UAV is the only system of its class that is purpose-built to provide deployed Marines, Sailors, Airmen, Soldiers, and Coast Guard autonomous resupply in the lethal, fluid combat environment that future military operations will entail or for regular logistics missions. Our deployed service men and woman have persistent logistics challenges that we are answering with this reliable, maintainable and affordable solution,” said Ian Walsh, CEO of Kaman Corporation.

The company says the vehicle also has multiple commercial applications.

Designed to provide cost-effective cargo hauling in its conformal pod or external sling load configuration, the KARGO UAV will self-deploy with no payload up to 602 miles with a maximum lifting capacity of 800 pounds. It should be able to haul approximately 90 gallons of water in an external bucket.

In September, 2021, flight development testing of a scaled KARGO UAV demonstrator was completed to prove out the air vehicle design, and flight-testing of a full-scale autonomous vehicle is planned for 2022. The KARGO UAV leverages commercial off-the-shelf components as well as thousands of hours of automated and autonomous flight data from Kaman’s K-MAX TITAN program, to reduce schedule and technical risk.

Kaman worked with Near Earth Autonomy as a partner to provide obstacle avoidance and other technologies such as precision landing, sense and avoid, and navigation in a GPS-denied environment.

In 2015 near Boise, Idaho Kaman and Lockheed demonstrated for wildland fire officials how a remotely piloted K-MAX UAV could drop water on a simulated fire and carry sling loads of cargo.


Our take:

We have written quite a bit recently about new UAVs, because there is a great deal of iteration and activity in the field. Some of the aircraft are already flying and others are still in the concept stage. Not all of them will take to the air or be used in a meaningful way. However, the interest in UAVs combined with limited numbers of firefighters, advances in technology, and increasing wildland fire acres produces an environment ripe for being exploited by nimble forward-thinking companies.

It appears likely that in the near future UAV helicopters will assist wildland firefighters not only by dropping water on fires but by resupplying them in remote areas with food, drinking water, hose, water tanks, and portable pumps — day or night. Already they are used for mapping, real time intelligence, and aerial ignition.

The limiting factor is government funding, and how quickly the old guard fire hierarchy can adapt their thinking to pilotless aircraft and flying at night.

Thanks and a tip of the hat go out to Gerald.

Video update on use of drones on wildfires

Posted on Categories Drone/UAV/UAS
video on the use of UAS
Image from the CAL FIRE video on the use of Unmanned Aerial Systems on wildfires.

The California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, CAL FIRE, released this two-minute video about the use of unmanned aerial systems, drones, on wildfires. Produced by their Incident Management Team #1, it features the Dixie Fire from earlier this year which burned 963,000 acres near Susanville, California.