- Gaining ground against wildfires
- Hot ideas give firefighters a safety boost
- Fire shelters help prevent injuries
- Blaze caught firefighters trapped in 'extreme of extreme'
Gaining ground against wildfires
Technology helps firefighters work efficientlyMISSOULA -- Barely a firefighter could be spared when another thunderstorm floated above Glacier National Park last summer, raking its forests with lightning.
Thousands of acres were already burning. The lightning created yet another monster.
Instead of plowing miles of fire line to corral the blaze, fire managers relied on a new piece of software that predicted the exact path and arrival time of the flames. Firefighting resources were marshaled at a critical point downwind from the advancing fire. If the computer was correct, the firefighters would have no trouble taming the blaze.
"They held the fire," said David Tippets, a Forest Service spokesman from Ogden, Utah. "They predicted right down to within a couple hundred yards. It's amazing."
New technology is revolutionizing how wildfires are fought. Satellites with thermal-imaging cameras snoop deep into the backcountry looking for hidden fires. A massive new map is being drawn to catalog fuel types on every acre of the nation's forests. Powerful software is taking some of the mystery and madness out of wildfire.
Many of the advances have been engineered in a brick building on the outskirts of Missoula. This is the home of the U.S. Forest Service Fire Sciences Laboratory, the world's leading research center for wildland fires. Next door is another Forest Service facility, where much of the agency's protective gear for firefighters is designed.
The heart of the fire lab is a combustion chamber the size of a large garage, but much taller and with a giant fume hood hanging from the ceiling. Researchers conduct controlled burns in the lab and in an adjoining wind tunnel.
With the flip of a switch, the chamber's air can be transformed from wind-swept chaparral to equatorial cloud forest. Dozens of tiny sensors are employed to gather data as fires sweep through miniature forests made of bundles of wood fiber. The raw data becomes the foundation on which all predictive wildfire modeling software is based, said Kevin Ryan, a project leader at the lab.
"We're able to understand these processes at a much more sophisticated level," he said.
National map
The information on fire behavior is being poured into a national project that is expected to someday give local firefighters instant access to the same powerful tools used to stop the fire outside Glacier National Park last summer. The project calls for a national database of historic weather patterns and regularly updated fuel conditions for every acre of forest. The fuel inventory is being created, acre by acre, using satellite images and field surveys.
About 27million acres in Western Montana and 19million acres in Utah were the first to be mapped and entered into the new national database. The modeling software was widely used across Montana in last summer's firefighting efforts.
Officials in Washington, D.C., like the system so much they want the entire country mapped and ready in five years. This will require a huge effort, Ryan said. When asked if the timetable was realistic, Ryan simply smiled and shrugged his shoulders.
Along with fire behavior data gathered in the Missoula lab's combustion chamber, the software will tap into a vast database of the burn characteristics of 2,000 species of trees, grasses and shrubs. The program knows that flames advance slowly through a field of spotted knapweed in 30percent humidity, for example, or that a stand of grand fir burns differently from a grove of Western larch.
With a laptop computer and an Internet connection, any fire manager will be able to log on to the system and zoom in on detailed topographic maps of a region. The software will analyze the local weather, fuels and topography to generate a precisely mapped out prediction of where the fire will spread.
The software will be especially helpful in designing safer and more effective prescribed burns, Ryan said.
According to recent Interior Department estimates, about 190million acres of Western forests are at risk for catastrophic wildfire. They have been without fire for too long because of the federal government's century-old policy of attacking every wildfire, no matter where it burns.
The Bush administration wants 4million acres of thick forest burned and thinned next year. This ambitious plan makes it even more critical to have better modeling tools, Ryan said.
Spotters in space
Wei Min Hao, another project leader at the lab, believes the future of firefighting will be high in the sky. Hao, a scientist trained at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard, developed software that employs NASA's Aqua and Terra satellites to find wildland fires from 450 miles above Earth.
This type of information once came only from lookout towers or airplane flights. The satellites pass over North America four times daily, beaming back their data to a receiver resembling a large golf ball on the roof of the Missoula fire lab. The satellite's thermal cameras can easily penetrate smoke and are only occasionally confused by manmade heat sources, such as the steel smelters near Chicago, Hao said.
"This is the first-ever system to monitor fire in almost real time," he said.
Previously, fire managers relied on information from aerial reconnaissance flights, but this information was often hours old or came from nighttime flights when the fire was inactive. The satellite images are more accurate, dependable and timely, Hao said.
The nation's top fire managers analyze the satellite images every morning during fire season. Fresh images also are sent to members of Congress and to the White House each afternoon, Hao said. Last summer, the information proved especially helpful, he said. During the peak of the fire season, as many as 80 fires were burning in the United States.
"This has become very, very critical for (national fire managers) to decide how to allocate resources," Hao said.
Within a decade, Hao hopes geostationary satellites, which stay in the same place above Earth, will be posted over the West sending back a constant stream of images. Such a system would cost about $1billion, he said, but would make firefighting even more efficient.
Measuring moisture
One of the smaller advancements in wildland firefighting technology is a fuel moisture meter from the Forestry Sciences Laboratory at the University of Idaho in Moscow. Although the device is only the size of a Thermos, it has the ability to transform prescribed burns from a blunt instrument into a precision tool for restoring forest health.
Research engineer Peter Robichaud developed the moisture meter. About 40 are in the field, at a cost of $1,300 each.
The meter works by sending an electronic pulse through a sample of forest floor debris, known as duff. The response of the pulse provides a near-instant reading on exactly how much moisture is contained in the fallen leaves, pine needles, small twigs and other organic material that provide fuel for fires.
The duff plays a huge role in how fast and hot a fire burns. Its moisture level is a critical piece of information when planning a prescribed burn, Robichaud said.
Previously, a sample would need to be analyzed in a lab. The process usually took at least 48 hours. Duff moisture content, however, can swing dramatically in the course of a day.
"This is the first method that can actually be used in real time," Robichaud said. "Old-time fire bosses would just pick up the duff, squeeze it, toss it into the wind and make a guess. They had that gut feeling."
Information from the moisture meter adds a new level of accuracy to the computer prediction software and decreases firefighters' anxiety. It's one more example of how wildland fires are being tamed by science.
"The more information you have, the better decisions people are going to make," Robichaud said. "It's that simple."
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Hot ideas give firefighters a safety boost
From shelters to `saw-proof' chaps, innovations aim to cut hazardsMISSOULA -- James Bond had gadget-master Geoffrey Boothroyd, aka "Q," working behind the scenes to develop the best tools for fighting villains.
The nation's 80,000 wild-land firefighters are backed by their own small army of engineers and researchers at the U.S. Forest Service's Missoula Technology and Development Center.
Fighting wildfires probably never will be as safe as preparing tax returns or teaching English literature. Yet, the job is getting safer, thanks in part to the work being done in Missoula.
Last year, 30 wild-land firefighters were killed during a season that included 63,608 wildfires, according to the National Interagency Fire Center in Boise. Nineteen of those deaths involved vehicle or aircraft crashes. Five were from heart attacks.
A small number of firefighters are burned to death each year on fire lines. But the development of a new fire shelter is expected to save some lives. The new shelter, which was developed by the Missoula Technology and Development Center at a cost of $40million, entered the national firefighting supply cache in June, but there were no reports of the shelter having to be deployed.
"It would make me happy if nobody used this thing," said Leslie Anderson, leader of the fire shelter design team.
The older shelter resembles a one-person pup tent and is made of fiberglass and aluminum foil glued together. Each firefighter carries one. The shelters can protect against radiant heat, but direct flame causes the glue to break down, enter the shelter and ignite. Since the late 1970s, about 20 firefighters have been killed despite using the shelters, Anderson said.
Work on the new shelter started nearly five years ago and involved field-testing during a series of controlled wildfire experiments in the forests of Canada's Northwest Territories. After considering 60 different materials, designers chose a combination of woven silica and metal foil. The new shelter is 80percent cooler than its predecessor when exposed to direct flame, according to the Forest Service.
Another recent innovation is improved "chain saw-proof" safety chaps for firefighters and foresters. The chaps are lined with a special weave of Kevlar fiber. Should a saw accidentally buck off a log and hit the chaps, the long fibers would be pulled into the motor, jamming the drive shaft in a split-second, said Tony Petrilli, an equipment specialist at the Missoula Technology and Development Center.
Both Petrilli and Anderson were originally trained as smokejumpers. Many of the ideas for improvement come from firefighters in the field, Petrilli said. This has always been the case, ever since legendary Forest Ranger Ed Pulaski designed a tool that could chop as well as dig. The Pulaski was designed nearly a century ago but remains a favorite of firefighters.
Dozens of proposals for improved equipment are submitted each year, Petrilli said. A national committee determines which projects will be developed for national distribution. Not all the projects are as grandiose as a new fire shelter.
Petrilli recently finished work on a new field pack that rides lower on the back, making it easier for firefighters to spend long hours chopping firelines with their Pulaskis. The pack includes the same water-carrying system used by soldiers and competition cyclists.
One of the recent advances from the Technology and Development Center is a portable washer, which can be used to scrub fire engines and other vehicles before leaving the scene of fires. The washer is expected to help reduce the spread of noxious weeds, which infest thousands of acres of wildlands.
Although improved fire shelters and tougher chaps will save lives and legs, some of the greatest advances in safety may come from improving the nutrition and immune systems of firefighters. Keeping firefighters rested, fed and hydrated goes a long way in helping them make rational decisions during the chaos of a wildfire, said Brian Sharkey, a physiologist and project leader at the Missoula Technology and Development Center. Sharkey is a pioneering researcher in the field of firefighter performance and nutrition.
"It may not be as dramatic as a new fire shelter, but it may save more lives in the long run," Sharkey said in a September interview with The Billings Gazette.
Smoke jumpers are now told to drink a quart of water the minute their feet hit the ground and a quart for each hour of work. They are also sent to the fires with enough food to replace the 6,000 calories burned over the course of an eight-hour shift.
Chow lines at fire camps are increasingly filled with nutritional, high-energy foods, rather than offerings like hamburgers and chicken fried steak. Many fire managers also provide antioxidant capsules and multivitamins for their crews.
Better training is another focus at the Technology and Development Center. The Forest Service is beginning to use a recently developed wildfire simulator to train crew leaders.
One of the simulators uses sound effects, heat blasters, flashing lights and piped-in smoke. The device can mimic everything from the arrival of a powerful windstorm to the unexpected blowup of a forested mountainside. It's the same type of system used to hone the skills of astronauts, fighter pilots and U.S. Army tank crews.
Aircraft used for firefighting are being updated with satellite modems and specialized tracking devices, said Bob Roth, who helped develop the tracking system at the Missoula Technology and Development Center. About 100 aircraft have already been outfitted.
The program will allow fire managers to track helicopters, spotter planes and air tankers using a laptop and any Internet connection.
"Our problem is we fly in areas where there isn't radar installations or we're in canyons below the radar," Roth said.
Although it's still on the drawing board, one of the biggest advances coming to firefighting will be hand-held computers and wireless data-sharing technology, Roth said. The idea is to arm wildland firefighters with the same information technology being used by soldiers on the battlefields in Iraq.
The program is expected to be unveiled in June. Until then, Roth did not want to reveal too many details, but he said it could be one of the most ambitious projects in the history of firefighting technology.
"We're prototyping units as we speak," he said.
The basics of the plan include handheld computers with moving, three-dimensional topographic maps and access to instant weather, fuels and fire information. The position of other firefighters and aircraft also would be displayed. Firefighters will play a close role in developing the system.
"We'll let them tell us what they need," Roth said. "The potential is as big as we want it to be."
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Fire shelters help prevent injuries
Device credited with saving at least 300 firefighters' livesFor wildland firefighters, being forced to use the cocoonlike fire shelter is akin to police officers firing their guns. It's something they hope will never happen.
But each year, about 70 fire shelters are deployed, according to the Forest Service. During last year's Devil Fire in California, a group of 55 firefighters were forced to crawl into their shelters. After the fire had passed, only two of the men had suffered burns and their injuries were minor, according to a report from the National Interagency Fire Center in Boise.
The shelters are credited with saving at least 300 lives and at least as many serious burns since they became standard issue in 1977. One notable save occurred on Aug. 29, 1985, when 73 firefighters were forced to use their shelters during the Butte Fire near Salmon, Idaho.
The firefighters stayed in their shelters for up to two hours as crown fires burned around them. After the fire had passed, only five needed to be hospitalized for heat exhaustion. According to a Forest Service accident report, at least 60 of the firefighters would have died without the shelters.
Those who have been saved by fire shelters have lived to tell terrifying tales. A Forest Service training manual uses statements from survivors to drive home the importance of avoiding situations where fire shelters are needed.
"This was like a nuclear blast occurring right over you and you're lying in tinfoil," one firefighter said.
"When the flame front hit, the shelter was unbearable," said another survivor. "I cannot put in words what it was like. It was just totally unbearable."
The training manual instructs firefighters to stay inside their shelter at all times.
"No matter how bad it gets inside the shelter, it will be much worse outside. If you panic and leave the shelter, one breath of hot gases can cause you to suffocate. Turbulence can lift a shelter's edge, letting in hot gases. Fires can generate winds of 50 mph or more, so you must hold the shelter down firmly. Entrapment can be extremely frightening and may lead to panic. Panic can cause firefighters to leave their shelters and make a run for it -- a far more hazardous gamble than staying put. Control such feelings so you can think clearly. Keep yourself calm by concentrating your attention on your breathing or on an object, person, or religious symbol that is meaningful to you."
During the fire's peak, the noise may be deafening, according to the manual.
"You do feel very isolated in there, and if you hear anything at all, the things you hear you don't want to hear, you wish you'd never heard. And it's so dark inside the shelter," according to a survivor.
Another firefighter recounts the noises heard from within a shelter: "One of the other firefighters began to pray out loud and it had almost a soothing effect at that point, listening to him do that."
Temperatures in a wildfire can top 2,000 degrees. Although the shelters reflect up to 95 percent of radiant heat, it can still get hot inside.
"It was extremely painful," according to a survivor. "Things that were going through my head were, `I'm going to die, this is going to kill me.' Afterwards, I remember thinking that because my legs were burned on the back of both calves and the backs of my thighs and it was so painful and it had gone on for such a long period of time that they were probably going to have to amputate my legs."
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Blaze caught firefighters trapped in 'extreme of extreme'
All the firefighting technology in the world might not have saved Jeff Allen and Shane Heath from the power of nature and the mistakes of their supervisors.The two Boise State University students were overrun by flames and died while fighting the Cramer fire in central Idaho in July.
The federal government investigated the deaths and released a 74-page report in January. The report cites a lack of management oversight and a shortage of firefighting resources as contributing factors in the deaths. The Forest Service continues to investigate officials for possible disciplinary action, according to a statement from Intermountain Regional Forester Jack Troyer.
Those leading the firefighters in the field told federal investigators they were sometimes confused over who was calling the shots, according to the report. A professional fire management officer was supposed to be working at the North Fork Ranger District, but the position had been vacant for more than a year because of "insufficient funds," according to the report. The deputy fire management officer was away when the fire was sparked by a lightning strike the night of Saturday, July 19.
Fire managers also failed to call the National Weather Service for a last-minute "spot check" forecast for the Cramer Creek area, according to the investigation. If they had, the fire managers would have learned that forecasters revised the forecast and were calling for higher winds.
Many of the firefighters, however, knew conditions in the forest were dangerous. One veteran firefighter told investigators, "We knew we were in the extreme of extreme."
Only a week earlier, a nearby fire had grown from 400 acres to 13,000 acres in six hours.
Resources were stretched thin when the Cramer fire started burning about 30 miles northwest of Salmon. There were other, bigger blazes in the forest. Little was done to fight the Cramer fire in the Salmon-Challis National Forest during its first two days.
By Tuesday morning, a concerted attack was being planned. The fire had grown to nearly 200 acres, and the incident commander hoped to have it safely contained by sunset. According to the official accident report, this is how Jeff Allen, 24, of Salmon, and Shane Heath, 22, of Melba, were killed:
Tuesday, July 22, 8:34 a.m.: Helicopter-166 touches down at a landing site near the Cramer fire to allow fire managers to plan for the upcoming day. They identify safety zones and escape routes for the incoming crews of firefighters. They decide a second helicopter landing area is needed on the opposite side of the fire, about one mile northwest of the primary landing pad. This would make it easy to insert a crew of firefighters to secure the west flank of the fire.
9:29 a.m.: Helicopter-193 launches from the Cove Creek helicopter base, 13 miles away from the fire, with "helitack" crew members Allen and Heath. The two will rappel down ropes to the fire area. Their task is to use chain saws to clear about a dozen pine trees from the second landing site.
9:43 a.m.: Allen and Heath reach the ground safely. The helicopter returns to base at Cove Creek.
10:47 a.m.: Helicopter-166 begins shuttling ground crew members, three at a time, from the base at Cove Creek to the main landing site. Another helicopter is at the fire doing "bucket work" -- using a giant, collapsible bucket to haul water from the nearby Salmon River.
12:30 p.m.: Temperature of 91 degrees, 18percent humidity, and winds up to 6mph. A helicopter pilot overhead notices a "hot spot" fire developing about a half-mile downhill from the landing pad being cleared by Allen and Heath.
1:26 p.m.: Helicopter-166 completes ferrying the 60 firefighters. Flames reaching 6 feet are spotted near the main landing site. On the other side of the fire, Allen radios in that he is safe but that 20 more minutes are needed to clear the site.
1:30 p.m.: In the Salmon River Canyon below the fire area, the temperature hits 106 degrees. Humidity is 15percent and winds are beginning to pick up. Fire managers begin to realize there is no way to rein in the flames today.
1:40 p.m.: The main landing site is threatened by fire. Ground crews are pulled back from the area.
2 p.m.: The main helicopter landing site is burned over.
2:23 p.m.: The fire begins to make a run toward Allen and Heath.
2:43 p.m.: Allen radios to a spotter plane circling above that they need 40 or 45 more minutes. Some of the ponderosa pines that need to be cut have trunks 24 inches across.
3 p.m.: Winds are now gusting to 30mph. The fires begin to "blow up." One of the aircraft above loses 1,000 feet of altitude from a powerful downdraft. Flames approach the landing site being created by Allen and Heath. A series of confusing radio transmissions causes the crew in the spotter plane to mistakenly believe Allen and Heath have been transported by helicopter to the main landing site. Both transport helicopters are back at the Cove Creek base. Helicopter-193 was down for a 30-hour maintenence inspection and refueling. Helicopter-166 was also at the base for refueling.
3:05 p.m.: Allen radios that he is ready for pickup from the new landing site. He is told Helicopter-193 will be sent. "Send them in a hurry," he says.
3:09 p.m.: Allen checks back with the base. The helicopter is still on the ground, he is told. Allen replies, "We need them right now." Base says it will send Helicopter-166, instead.
3:10 p.m.: The helibase radio operator asks if Allen is in danger and needs to go to the safety zone. Allen says he is not in immediate danger but the smoke is getting thick and he and Heath need a ride out right away.
3:12 p.m.: The base attempts to contact Allen.
3:13 p.m.: Allen responds and is told Helicopter-166 needs fuel but will leave "right away." The helicopter lifts off with just enough fuel to pick up Allen and Heath. When Allen hears the news, he replies, "Oh, God, we just got fire down below us. So the smoke's coming right at us -- just make them hurry up." The pilot of the plane circling above notices flames 50 feet high. The fire is advancing rapidly.
3:19 p.m.: Allen calls the helibase at Cove Creek and asks about the status of the helicopter. It's coming, he is told.
3:20 p.m.: The helicopter pilot arrives but says it is too smoky to land.
3:24 p.m.: Allen calls over the radio. "Could I get a helicopter up here right now?" His breathing is heavy and voice excited. The pilot of the spotter plane notices flames shooting 100 feet high. In the next several minutes, the flames overtake Allen and Heath.
3:30 p.m.: The radio is silent. The fire rages all afternoon, hiding any possible landing area with smoke.
5:55 p.m.: Two firefighters rappel into the area from a helicopter.
6:20 p.m.: The remains of Allen and Heath are found about 100 yards from the landing site they had carved. The rescuers also find the remains of two fire shelters. One shelter is still folded like an accordion. Another shelter has been partially unfolded. Investigators later determine temperatures in the area reached as high as 2,000 degrees.
Allen's and Heath's remains are flown out by helicopter the next afternoon. At Allen's funeral four days later in Salmon, a tanker plane and two helicopters pay tribute in a flyover.
