Visit with Downstown: direct initial attack

Fairly early on in my conversations with my friends at Downstown, they told me that they fly a lot of direct initial attack when their SEATs fly fires. Our conversations about direct initial attack continued and when I conceived of writing these articles on SEAT operations based on my visit to Downstown, I knew that I wanted to write an article about direct initial attack. What I write here is based on these conversations with my friends at Downstown.

You may recall that when I wrote about dispatch operations that I said that ground and aerial resources are dispatched to a wildfire at the same time. This dispatch happens immediately, often when the wildfires are quite small. Perhaps the fire is a small unpermitted open burn, or a smoldering campfire. When the SEAT arrives at the fire, they will drop on top of the flames, this is direct attack. More over, they often drop on the head of the fire. Keep in mind that when flying direct attack, the fires are small in size, I'll get to larger fires in a later article.

Moving on to initial attack. While ground and aerial resources are dispatched immediately and at the same time, the SEAT often arrives at the fire before the New Jersey Forest Fire Service (NJFFS) ground resources. In this scenario, the SEAT is the first resource at the fire, i.e. they are the initial attack. Combine direct attack on a small fire with initial attack and you have direct initial attack. Sometimes direct initial attack by the SEAT involves only one run. One very important run.

The SEAT pilot having arrived at the fire first is then a position to provide aerial observations and size-up the fire to the Incident Commander (IC) who may still be traveling to the fire. The pilot knows most of the ICs  and tower observers and they know him, so he can identify the IC by their voice. After providing any fire size-up and other observations to the IC as the situation warrants, the pilot will make the drop on the fire. If the fire is small, this will be direct initial attack. Direct initial attack is crucial here in NJ because of the wildland urban interface.

Direct initial attack. SEAT(s) working in support of the troops on the ground to knock the fire out while it is still small. During those two weeks in April of extreme fire weather and Red Flag Warnings our SEATs did a lot of direct initial attack work. Some of these fires I heard about from my friends at Downstown. Other small fires I knew of from listening to the online scanner feed for Division B. Many of these fires  were under a couple of acres, knocked out in a couple of hours. Direct initial attack.

I remember one fire from a couple of years ago in the Pine Barrens during the spring wildfire season. I knew enough at the time to know from listening to the online scanner feed that the fire could of grown into a large fire. I also recall hearing the SEAT(s) working the fire. Between the SEAT(s) and the ground troops the fire was knocked out while it was small. Knocked out in an afternoon. Don't recall the size, perhaps 5 to 10 acres.

Next up on May 23: SEAT operations on larger fires