A tale of Antarctic helo ops amid the summer heat

By PAUL M. ROSS JR

PHOTOS COURTESY NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION Several aerial firefighters switch gears in the winter to staff helicopters in Antarctica for a variety of scientific and logistical operations.

While the summer fire season turns up the heat, let's take a few minutes to bring some cooler thoughts to the firelines... Each year, several aerial firefighters travel to Antarctica for winter helicopter operations, which were described to us by longtime helitack firefighter Brian Kliesen.

According to Kliesen, the National Science Foundation contracts with Raytheon Polar Services to provide logistical support for the U.S. Antarctic Program, which conducts scientific research and other operations on the frozen continent. "At McMurdo Station, Raytheon works with another contractor, Petroleum Helicopters, Incorporated [PHI], to provide helicopter support," Kliesen explains. "This contract, administered by the Department of Interior's Aviation Management unit, calls for two A-Star B2 and two Bell 212 helicopters to provide logistical science support in the field to about 250 miles [outside of] McMurdo Station." McMurdo is one of the longtime U.S. operations bases on Antarctica.

A helicopter operations supervisor and an assistant work with scheduling, communications and crisis management, while a lead crewperson and four crewmembers work on the pad. "We also work with the Antarctic New Zealand Program at Scott Base, and an additional Bell 212 from Helicopters New Zealand operates from our helibase," Kliesen adds. "Around mid-December, the U.S. Coast Guard arrives with two HH65B Dauphin Helicopters that we also use, when time allows, to provide additional support."

"The lead crew this year was [led by] Ryan Garber, USFS smokejumper out of McCall, Idaho," Kliesen continues. "Ryan kept us working hard and directed our efforts in developing inspection procedures for our rigging, inventory, safety [and] training and [in] building our ever-growing Antarctic Helicopter Operations Guide."

Firefighters work with a variety of helicopter types in Antarctica, including AStars and Bell 212s, the same types used each summer in U.S. firefighting ops.

Kliesen reports that Phil Reid from Idaho's Price Valley Helitack returned for a second season. "Phil was our lead trainer and problem solver in the field, as well as director of our physical fitness program," he says. "He did an outstanding job and was invaluable [during] early-season training to our two new crewmembers."

New team members were Nick Giguere, a National Park Service ranger from Mount Rainer, Wash., and Andre Ruoti, an aviation manager from the Miles City, Mont., BLM. "Both did an excellent job this year, being thrown immediately into the fray, manifesting and briefing literally hundreds of passengers, and loading and unloading thousands of pounds of cargo in their first few weeks," Kliesen notes. "They were an excellent addition to the team, providing insight and assistance in our continuing efforts to develop our Antarctic Helicopter Operations Guide."

In previous years, several other aerial firefighters from across the United States have participated in operations down on the ice. "We have had some outstanding individuals in the Antarctic Program," Kliesen says, "including Brian Butler of Durango [Colo.] Helitack, Kevin Raymond and Todd Pederson of Idaho's Price Valley Helitack, Gifford 'The Hammer' Wong of Vale [Ore.] Helitack and Steve 'I'll have two tuna sandwiches' Hopkins, USFS Smokejumper out of Redmond, Ore. I enjoy the flexibility this crew affords me in allowing me to go to Antarctica each year."

PHOTOS PAUL M. ROSS JR. Pilot Eddie Thoroughgood maneuvers his Bell 212 to fill the bucket for another drop on the Dragon Fire, one of several lightning caused fires that started in June in Utah and Arizona.

Nevada, Utah Fires Challenge Aviation Units
Significant fine fuel loads meant long hours in the sky for air crews fighting Nevada wildfires in late June; by early July, a staggering 520,000 acres had burned in the Southern Nevada Complex near Mesquite. Nine helicopters and nearly 800 firefighters worked several large fires within the complex, but high winds during the last week of June limited air operations throughout the area. Crews contained the complex in early July.

The Fork Fire in the Ely District saw a reported acreage increase of more than 120,000 acres in just over one day. Such rapid spread rates meant flames gobbled up square miles of ground, frequently outpacing the work of ground and aerial firefighters.

Utah has also seen its share of extreme fire activity this season. Fifteen hundred firefighters, eight helicopters, single-engine airtankers and several heavy airtankers worked to slow the flames on more than six large fires in the southwestern portion of the state. "The fire behavior [looked] really intense [when] viewed from the air," says helicopter pilot Greg Haufle, who flew a K-MAX heavy-lift helicopter from Washington's Rainier Heli-Lift on large fires outside St. George, Utah, including the Tweedy Fire. "It seemed acres at a time would ignite with the wind and cured grasses." Quick turnaround times between dipsites and Haufle's sector of the fire allowed him to make more than 250 bucket drops during one mission. "Air Attack and Lead 88 [the lead plane] were good to work with and kept air operations moving smoothly," Haufle adds. "And the helibase was well-run also."

P2V Airtankers Given the OK to Fly
Federal fire aviation policymakers have approved the return of P2V Neptune heavy airtankers to aerial firefighting service. This announcement follows preliminary results of a study on P2V airtankers, which showed they could be used this summer. "While many wildland fires are effectively suppressed on the ground without the need of air support, aerial resources remain one of the many tools that assist firefighters in stopping more than 99 percent of all fires before they ever become unmanageable," says Mark Rey, U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) undersecretary for natural resources and environment. "Airtankers are a critical component of the fire suppression program."

Airtanker operators Minden Air of Minden, Nev., and Missoula, Mont.-based Neptune Aviation welcomed the news. "We're much more optimistic about the future than we were at the beginning of the fire season," says Minden Operations Manager Tim Christy.
"Our planes have considerably less than the 15,000 hours identified as the service life of the aircraft."

Neptune's Director of Aviation Safety Chris Holm reported three of his company's eight P2Vs-Tankers 7, 12 and 44-are currently in service; Neptune's Tanker 5 received its federal firefighting card the first week of July. "We should have one aircraft back in service every week following Tanker 5," states Holm.

In May 2004, the United States Forest Service (USFS) and the Bureau of Land Management terminated the contracts for 33 heavy airtankers due to the National Transportation Safety Board's concerns about the airworthiness of the aircraft. In July 2004, the agencies determined the airworthiness of eight P-3s and returned these planes to service.

In February 2005, the USFS initiated an engineering study to determine the operational service life (OSL) of nine P2Vs. USFS officials chose Avenger Aircraft and Services LLC, a company composed of aviation engineers who have previous experience with Lockheed products, to conduct the study. The OSL is expressed in how many hours an aircraft can be safely flown, accounting for the stresses imposed on the airframe during different flight missions. Since the P2Vs were in service before the U.S. Navy developed its structural analysis and fatigue life limit programs, acquiring this information required additional engineering work. In a typical fire season, officials estimate a P2V aircraft flies approximately 200-300 hours.

Preliminary results of the study found that some P2V aircraft could, using federal and Avenger evaluation criteria, safely return to service. Once additional inspections are completed on the P2V aircraft, officials expect two of the aircraft currently on limited service to return to full service. The seven additional aircraft from Neptune and Minden Air will come on line as inspections are completed. But federal officials state that even though the OSL assesses how many hours the aircraft can safely operate, agencies still need more data about the stresses placed on aircraft in the firefighting environment. As a result, two P2Vs and one DC-7 are currently on contract with monitoring equipment to gather that data, and the USFS is buying and installing operational load monitoring equipment for the rest of the heavy airtanker fleet.

The USFS has hired a different aviation engineering contractor to determine the OSL for the Douglas DC-4, DC-6 and DC-7 tankers. Until that information is developed, the agencies state they will not use them for firefighting.

A USFS/DOI press release issued in late May reiterated the need for heavy airtankers as part of a balanced air attack. "Our primary goals remain firefighter safety and maintaining a 99 percent initial-attack success rate with the right combination of tactics and tools," the release states. "The P2Vs that return to service are a part of the aerial firefighting fleet that supports the ground firefighter. The large airtankers, helicopters, helitankers and single-engine airtankers all play a role in meeting the needs of each unique incident."

Send your fire aviation news via phone or e-mail to Paul M. Ross, Jr., Wildland Firefighter Magazine, at 208/861-1340 or prossjr@yahoo.com.

Paul M. Ross, Jr. is a firefighter/Helitack squad leader and a professional writer with 14 years experience in both Western U.S. wildland firefighting and urban fire-rescue. He lives in St. Louis, Mo., where he is a firefighter/EMT for the Eureka Fire Protection District. Contact him at prossjr@yahoo.com.

Update on Fire Aviation Folks Former smokejumper Carl Gidlund checked in with an update about his aerial firefighting years. Gidlund, now retired and living in Idaho, began parachuting to fires in 1958. "I worked my way through the University of Montana's Journalism School as a smokejumper ['58-'61], then entered the army and, because of the jumping background, was assigned to the 7th Special Forces Group when I graduated from Army Intelligence School," says Gidlund. "Went airborne, of course, and became an army jumpmaster." Gidlund returned from Vietnam as a chief warrant officer, finished his B.A. at the University of Montana and went on to receive a master's degree, supporting himself again, in part, as a smokejumper in 1966. "During the jumper years, I was assigned to the Missoula base, but jumped out of several more, including Winthrop, Redding, Fairbanks, Silver City and Grangeville," he explains. He served as a Type I incident information officer while working as a public affairs officer for the BLM in Nevada and Alaska, and for the USFS in Texas and Idaho. Retired from the USFS seven years ago, Gidlund remains active with the National Smokejumper Association, serving as director and then president (1999-2000). "Each summer, with about 100 other former smokejumpers, I work trails and repair Forest Service buildings as a volunteer in Idaho and Montana," he says. His unique professional positions after smokejumping have included working as a radio newsman, a newspaper reporter, an actor in commercials and training films, a charter boat owner and skipper and a public-affairs officer for the president's office of emergency planning and the U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare. He presently writes a column for the Spokesman-Review newspaper and is also a hospice volunteer. Gidlund shared recollections of his most memorable fire jump, which occurred on New Mexico's Gila National Forest in 1960. "High winds pulled me backwards out of a scrub oak, and I fell about 20 feet to the ground," he says. "Ended up with a fractured skull and a bad attitude, but am fully recovered and just a bit crazy!"