In the last six years, the wildlands of Southern California experienced significant drought-promoted vegetation mortality. As of April 2004, more than 475,000 acres of vegetation on both private and public lands suffered in the San Bernardino and San Jacinto Mountains, home to approximately 100,000 people. Agencies and private industry experts estimate that more than 1 million trees have already died on private lands. Estimates indicate the number of dead trees will continue to mount as the bark beetle infestation grows. Between 13 million and 15 million trees are dead or dying within the San Bernardino National Forest. Significant brush field dieback is also occurring, causing an increase in dead-to-live fuel composition. The result is obvious: If a large fire occurs, it will likely threaten the lives of thousands of residents and recreationists.

PHOTOS COURTESY CHIEF TOM SHERMAN, BUREAU OF LAND MANAGEMENT San Bernardino National Forest personnel start a progressive hose lay near Camp Emerson. Early in the incident, command stressed the importance of both structure protection and perimeter control.

Two Mountain Area Safety Taskforces (MAST) have emerged as key components in the fight to mitigate fuels and protect the area against the threat of fire. In the summer of 2005, the Riverside County MAST conducted a live training exercise that demonstrated the important role this group will play if and when fire strikes. 

Threat & Response
Problems caused by declining forest health in the San Jacinto and Santa Rosa mountains first became evident in July 2001. Personnel were quick to respond in several ways, including declaring a local emergency, freeing funds for tree removal and to purchase chippers and directing power companies to mitigate hazards around power lines. In addition, former Governor Gray Davis declared a state of emergency, which eased restrictions in the California Forest Practice rules to facilitate emergency tree felling.

But perhaps the most crucial part of addressing drought mortality has been the formation of two MASTs in both the San Bernardino and San Jacinto mountains. The MASTs consist of elected officials' staff, several governmental agencies, public utilities and private organizations, with the main public safety organizations taking the lead. Many of the MAST activities surround prevention of fires and reduction of community hazards, but the MASTs are also responsible for ensuring operational readiness within a unified command framework, including response and evacuation activities. With preparedness in mind, the Riverside County MAST unified commanders held a table top exercise on May 24,  2005, followed by a full field exercise on June 15, 2005, which included more than 40 engine companies and 20 fire officers.

Drill Preparation
The field exercise took six months to develop and about four hours to execute. Once the Riverside County MAST and the individual MAST agencies approved the idea for the drill, a group of fire and law enforcement agencies developed a drill incident action plan (IAP) and a drill scenario. Planning efforts included determining drill objectives, assignments, location and scenario specifics and recruiting agency participation.

GIS technician specialists created maps for the drill, which were very helpful for drill planning and execution. Using sophisticated fire behavior prediction models, fire officers developed a fire-spread projection for the simulated fire.

Immediately following the drill, participants conducted a critique to determine what went well and what needed improvement.

Planners met many times before the drill to finalize the IAP. One of the biggest planning unknowns: the actual fire weather on the day of the drill. The fire weather and active fire incidents would drive agency participation. If the weather was severe, agencies could not afford to send as many resources from their home bases. Real fires would also cause resources to be unavailable for the drill.

The completed IAP included details of the location and makeup of the incident command post (ICP); it also specified who would participate, who would serve as drill facilitators, and what drill inputs facilitators would give to the drill players. Planners chose Idyllwild, a resort village in the San Jacinto Mountains, as the location for the drill because it's located in the middle of the MAST organizational area and it presents many interface zone challenges.

The Drill Day
On June 15 at 0630 hrs, the MAST incident commanders (ICs) — after evaluating the predicted fire behavior and the current regional fire status — gave the go-ahead for the drill. Participating agencies sent resources to Idyllwild while agency administrators and drill planners met to finalize preparation and execution.

The drill called for two staging areas, one north and one south of the drill location. Planners wanted to simulate a real scenario for responding resources coming from two directions. Staging area managers manned both areas, checking in responders and ensuring accurate resource status. Responders began to arrive at 0800 hrs; at 0900 hrs, the lead planner provided an incident briefing. Using maps and distributing the IAP, he explained the drill scenario and discussed participant expectations.

At 0920 hrs, the drill began with the announcement of a fire in the Bear Trap drainage at the southwest side of town, near the Idyllwild Arts Academy. The fire was deliberately located in an area that would immediately require the formation of a unified command involving personnel from the San Bernardino National Forest (SBNF) and the Idyllwild Fire Protection District (IFPD). Very shortly thereafter, the rapidly spreading fire burned into the southwest side of town, necessitating evacuations. At this point, the Riverside Sheriffs Department (RSD) assigned a unified IC to work with the two fire agencies. ICs established a field ICP near the Arts Academy.

At 1015 hrs, command relocated the ICP to the Idyllwild Fire Protection District headquarters. There, the original ICs reorganized and established a five-way unified command: SBNF, IFPD, Riverside County Fire (represented by the CDF, which protects the unincorporated area of Pine Cove, north of IFPD), RSD and the California Highway Patrol (CHP). They established the following incident objectives:

1. Protect lives and property (structures);
2. Hold the fire west of Idyllwild;
3. Hold the fire south of State Route 243 where it meets Bear Trap Creek;
4. Hold the fire south or east of Pine Cove; and
5. Prevent the rear of the fire from backing into southern IFPD.

In addition, the ICs strongly emphasized the importance of performing both structure protection and perimeter control on the fire. During real wildland/urban interface (WUI) fires, it's common to see most fire engines assigned to only protect life and property. But during this drill, fire engines and fire crews were assigned to perform perimeter control evolutions as well. They laid progressive hoselays and constructed firelines along the simulated fire's edges.   

The RSD committed more than 50 deputy sheriffs and many command officers to the drill so they could gain experience working with the incident command system and test the MAST evacuation pre-plan. Officers went door-to-door contacting residents as they would during a real emergency. They also involved an animal rescue organization and the County Animal Control.

At about 1130 hrs, drill commanders terminated the drill. Engine companies and fire crews returned to the two staging areas for a debriefing with their branch directors and their division supervisors. At 1230 hrs, command and general staff and agency visitors conducted a debriefing at the ICP.

Large multi-agency responses require extensive preplanning to ensure smooth communications. The Idyllwild drill incorporated a Nextel portable cell phone repeater and communication vehicles.

Lessons Learned
The drill provided some valuable lessons, helping MAST personnel identify what strategies and tactics worked well, and which needed improvement to ensure the best possible response during a real wildfire.

Communications

• Integrate high-band VHF frequencies with 800-MHz law enforcement frequencies. Interoperability was outstanding due to all fire agencies operating on high-band VHF; however, real response requires high-band VHF interoperability by all response agencies, not just fire agencies.
• Ensure all personnel are familiar with the radio plan and use.
• Order mobile communications/command units early for both fire and law enforcement.
• Order portable radio mobile relays and cell phone repeaters early during the incident.

Command & Control

• Perform both perimeter control and structure protection. Structure protection is a high priority that will demand a large amount of resources and coordination.
• Work with CalTrans and County Roads to ensure a clear route of travel for emergency vehicles and evacuees.
• Establish trigger points in the incident's progression to assist command in proper decision making,
• Obtain better maps showing streets, topography and special problems.
• Make the staging area large enough to hold the anticipated number and type of resources ordered.
• Address finance issues with the multi-jurisdictional and multi-agency response properly and in a timely manner.
• Include additional drill facilitators. For a drill this size, about 10 facilitators were needed, or two facilitators for each assigned incident command system division. 
• Require all assigned participants to attend the incident briefing at the beginning of the drill.

Who's  Involved? The organizations participating in the Riverside County Mountain Area Safety Taskforce U.S. Forest Service San Bernardino National Forest Bureau of Land Management, California Desert District California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (CDF)  Riverside County Fire Department (protection provided under cooperative agreement with the CDF) Idyllwild Fire Protection District Riverside County Sheriffs Department Riverside County Office of Emergency Services National Resource Conservation Service California Highway Patrol California Department of Parks and Recreation California Department of Transportation Southern California Edison (electric utility) Pine Cove Water District Hemet Water District Mountain Communities Fire Safe Council (a citizen volunteer group)

Incident Command System

• Implement a unified command.
• Assign branch and division assignments.
• Strengthen the information officer (IO) information dissemination phase and include assistant IOs who operate in the field.
• Establish a joint information center in Riverside County to allow multiple agencies to coordinate information dissemination with the media.
• If possible, include one assistant safety officer per division, although division supervisors should be fully prepared to oversee safety issues.
• Maintain good resource status at the staging areas and assign staging area managers.

Engine Evolutions

• Conduct regular WUI engine practice. 
• Use engines to provide WUI structure protection (backing, multiple short hose lays around structures and "bump and run" tactics). 

Multi-Agency Coordination

• Co-locate fire and law enforcement together in the ICP to prevent communication problems.
• Prepare law enforcement to confront a "5150" (incorrigible individual) scenario.
• Ensure animal evacuation is preplanned.
• Start evacuation efforts early in the incident.
• Obtain more law-enforcement patrol units and pre-plans.
• Create an agency/position ID/accountability system.
• Obtain a local incident mobile radio repeater to improve communications. The Sheriffs Department experienced significant interoperability issues integrating its 800-Mhz system with the fire agencies' high-band VHF system.

Drill Value
Were the four hours spent drilling worth the six months of preparation? During the debriefing, all participants agreed that the drill was of great value to MAST planning efforts. Since then, MAST personnel have taken steps to address some of the issues that arose during the drill.

Although drought mortality and bark beetle infestation continue to raise the wildfire risk in the San Bernardino and San Jacinto mountains, last year's drill has helped prepare the community's public safety personnel for a real fire. MAST efforts are crucial to ensuring the safety of the public and the firefighters who will respond to a fire, when and if it occurs.

John Hawkins is the fire chief for the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (CDF) and the Riverside (Calif.) County Fire Department. Hawkins supervises special operations and has worked for the CDF for 44 years.