CAL FIRE's airtankers

I have found myself thinking about CAL FIRE recently, in part because I some of my family recently moved to southern California. I told my friends that CAL FIRE is top notch. I told them that they have 23 Grumman S-2T 1,200 gallon airtankers (1 is relief), and 14 OV-10A airtactical aircraft (1 is relief) at 13 bases around the state. In addition,CAL FIRE has 11 UH-1H Super Huey Helicopters (1 is relief). I told them where the closest CAL FIRE tanker base is. It happens to be Ramona and here is Ramona's webcam. Romana has two S-2T tankers (70 and 71). For a clickable map showing the locations of all 13 CAL FIRE tanker bases, go to this webpage of the CAL FIRE Pilot's Association.

I told them a little about initial attack, that the mission of CAL FIRE's tankers is to fly initial attack. According to this CAL FIRE web page on their air program, CAL FIRE's aircraft can reach most fires within 20 minutes. In initial attack, tankers and helos are deployed to a wildfire as soon as possible. The goal being to keep the fire as small as possible (1 to 10 acres) until ground troops can arrive. CAL FIRE is very good at initial attack.

I write more about initial attack here, here and here.

I have to admit that I wondered how and if the termination of Aero Union's contract by the US Forest Service might affect CAL FIRE's aerial firefighting guidelines. It did not take me long to remember that the mission, if you will. of CAL FIRE's tankers and helos is initial attack. Still I wondered . . .

Then, a couple of days ago, I saw references on a couple of websites (wildland fire and smokeinshow refering to a memo from CAL FIRE updating CAL FIRE's aircraft response guidelines, saying in part:

CAL FIRE will dispatch air tankers on initial attack (IA) in accordance with
existing agreements and per the California Mobilization Guide under the closest
forces concept. If a federal incident requires "load and return" of CAL FIRE air
tankers or additional CAL FIRE air tankers are ordered for the incident, the
Federal GACC will order federal air tankers(s) from the other California GACC or
through NICC as appropriate to replace CAL FIRE IA air tankers. CAL FIRE air
tankers should NOT be considered as a replacement for federal aircraft on
extended attack or major Federal incidents in California. ... CAL FIRE reserves the right to deny a request for use of CAL FIRE aircraft based
on CAL FIRE need to maintain effective initial attack capability and support
CAL FIRE extended attack or major incidents.

I was reassured to hear that CAL FIRE's mission of deploying tankers and helos for initial attack is unchanged after the grounding of Aero Union's tankers. You may want to refer to the memo itself for more information, it may downloaded as a pdf file here (also referred to above, so you don't have to download it twice).

The CAL FIRE tankers, including the two at Romona, will continue to fly initial attack. Or stay on call waiting for the initial attack call.

And may God help us if there are one or two major fires at the same time.

Up later in the week (I hope): an article or two with a little more information on Conair's Convair 580 tankers. As I understand it, these tankers are under contract/lease from our Canadian neighbors to the north.

Notes:

For more information about the Federal GACC (Geographic Area Coordination Center), see the GACC website. There are two GACC's for California, northern CA and southern CA.

According to the National Interagency Coordination Center (NICC) website:

The National Interagency Coordination Center (NICC) is the focal point for coordinating the mobilization of resources for wildland fire and other incidents throughout the United States.

Aircraft are a resource.