Taking the fight to the night against California's wildfires with new helicopters
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- Опубликовано: 10 июн 2024
- Bill Whitaker reports on the largest helicopter to ever fight fires at night, used in California as the state faced one of its most intense fire years ever.
#60Minutes #News #Wildfires
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As a former firefighter, the greatest thing about firefighting is tradition and the worst part of firefighting is tradition.
Why don't firefighters use FLIR from planes or satellite's to gauge fires?
@@janeblogs324 so you want them to militarize?
@@janeblogs324 They do. Cal Fire has a large aviation fleet and contractors and they use FLIR and long range cameras I just guess they don't use them for night ops
@@Red.Thing. I'm yet to see a military defend citizens homes.
I'm talking technology, not military
@@Red.Thing. Ya, Why not?
Fighting at night is so important because it is when the wind dies down. Sometimes the only relief in the spread of the fire is during the middle of the night.
it's a shame that fires aren't fought more at night... maybe they are
@Vanghost gahahahahahaha
Not just because the wind dies down, but some places it actually switches direction and rolls over on itself. This is an exceptional opportunity to get in front of the head before daytime comes and original course resumes.
Also let's not forget that humidity rises at night
Unless the fire hits a thermal belt at night & really starts to run.
The infrared night shots of the "fire geyser" totally supports the fact that the winds die down at night. It would have been interesting to have seen a drop on that fire geyser to see what effect the water would have had on it.
When fighting for your "turf" is more important than fighting the fires, every single senior manager at the Forest Servic and at CalFire should be fired and replaced with people who have the common sense to know what is actually important.
We just had another fire, the sheep fire in Wrightwood southern California. Hot shot crews were here, the choppers and aircraft as I watched the fire all night, flames, and embers rising into the sky, getting closer. Thank God all the crews were able to stop it before it got to our little village. I'm grateful these brave, innovative professionals are using these high tech choppers!
No, you're an environment-hater. These Chinook Helicopters must be banned immediately. They run on a petroleum-based form of diesel fuel. That's Fossil Fuel: the enemy of civilization that will bring on the mass destruction of humanity and the entire animal kingdom!!! Until these Chinook Helicopters are run on solar panels, they must be banned. Now!!!
You are in Victorville or Adalanto?
@name No. Thank God.....in all his Glory.....ALLOWING man to be able to do their job!
Wow, so glad to hear swift action was taken. My dad grew up in Wrightwood and we still have the family home there. Someday I will inherit it. Built in the 20's!
I live in the Santa Cruz mountains now where the CZU fire took place. I was wasn't living here at the time but I've been told it was very traumatic for the community here and people are on high alert. I'm pregnant and pray our community doesn't have to go through again.
@@barrybarry5803 Most of California is a high risk fire area, including much of the SF Bay Area and much of the greater LA area.
In addition to that, the entire coastal area of CA is a high risk area for a magnitude 8 or greater earthquake. If the San Andreas Fault rips from the Bay Area to LA, it will cause hundreds of billions in damage.
Parts of California are also at risk of flooding, landslides and blizzards. There are few areas of CA that don't face some kind of natural disaster risks.
I live in northern California and there has been talk for several years about the infighting with CALFire. Citizens are always told that it is just a rumor, but turns out to be true. This is just insane with the amount of property loss, health problems and most importantly loss of life due to fires that could have been extinguished a lot earlier.
USFS will not let CalFire jump on fires in their domain. The Tamarack Fire and the Caldor Fire last year are prime examples of USFS deliberate negligence. And there were other fires in years past that USFS did not fight at the outset, and eventually blew up into something big.
The government thinks or hopes the majority of people are to stupid to catch on to their wrong doing. My grandpa never made it past 4th grade. One of my uncles never made it past 9th grade but both were smarter then most of the local politicians.
El Dorado hotshot here, the #1 cause of these extreme fires is climate change. We dont make it political, we make it about mother nature. The temperature of earth is rising. Fires like these are the new normal. We use to have fire seasons....now we have fire years.
Fires are goimg faster. Thats why we are deploying these beasts to help fight
Burned to heat homes. It burned anyway.
I prefer fire departments flying former military helicopters than police departments driving MRAP Armored vehicles.
👍
…no one asked?
@@cristianortega5850 i asked
@@cristianortega5850 worry about your country, you’re just jealous because Mexico can’t afford this one
The police need those just as much as the fire dept needs the chinooks.
Appreciate the coverage of the infighting between USFS, state, and local agencies. The forest service is one of the pettiest and poorly managed agencies in the world. The middle management at FS district offices are some of the least motivated and bureaucratic people I’ve ever worked with.
I wish somebody would call them out and blow the whistle on this because their pettiness and inefficiency and lack of professionalism may have resulted in millions of acres of wilderness and homes burned 2 years ago. This is really outrageous and unacceptable. I hope the governor watched this and puts somebody on it. California should be better than this, bureaucrats or not.
@@mandyinseattle don’t we wish Indians were allowed to use controlled fires in the mild season? “instead of dumping CANCER CAUSING AGENTS IN THE BEAUTIFUL FOREAT OF CALIFORNIA” ??
@@mandyinseattle look too the clown governor’s leadership…..
I wish they let me finish with this business for some and tragedy for most.. we could run pvc, or metal pipes everywhere with sensors and sprinkles even with valves just to turn them off. So much we can do but instead someone is renting airplanes or choppers. Prevent is better than year after year they make them unporpose im sure. That's how they worried about the global warming? Who gets paid?
USFS is solely responsible for letting small fires becoming unmanageable conflagrations. People who live here in the Sierras know all about their ineptitude and deliberate malfeasance.
As the owner of a cabin that survived Caldor due to heroic firefighter efforts, earlier forest clearing, and phenomenal firefighting science, these aircraft are worth every penny! Take my money!
What are your thoughts on grazing or logging around your cabin just asking not trying to start an argument
@@guyedwards7690 we had some cleaning done several years ago and I was a big fan. In my great grandfather’s day it was all logged out except for a few trees. Those were felled last fall (dead from drought and bark beetles) but there are literally hundreds in their place. I think limited logging would be fine. So many homes in the area I think it would be more complicated than it would be worth to a logging company.
@@guyedwards7690 and not far from us there is grazing. Nothing much to graze on near the cabin.
I used to work for both the US Forest Service and the National Park Service after retiring from the Department of Defense (DoD). I have to say, with regards to management and work ethics, the NPS and the US Forest Service are light years behind DoD. Not hating, just stating the facts. Trying to improve work processes or policies in either agency is impossible to say the least. The word “change” to them is not even in their vocabulary.
That makes sense you know people are people in agencies are agencies you know and you got different states and different ways of life than that's how it works The human condition but as the melting pot of the world we will get through this we will always work through problems that's the American way we will get through this
Born and raised in Cali, I'd never heard of the Tuna fire. A few seconds later. I knew why. Thanking you hero's!!
Many of these agencies have leadership that view their responsibilities as fiefdoms. Any new tech or additional assets that doesn’t come from those agencies, is viewed with high skepticism and usually dismissed outright.
CalFire dismissed a proposal from a group of wealthy vineyard owners who were willing to purchase two firefighting airplanes to protect the Napa Valley, willing to pay for all the compliance necessary. Nope, got declined.
Months later, a contracted helicopter from Coulson was assigned to operate out of Napa airport.
Amazing to see older men agreeing to change! Acknowledging that they must side with technology to save lives! This is something many people in authority lack! This is amazing. Im excited to see what the future holds
To a person still trying to recover from this fire. Shame on these agencies
There is a 30 million dollar aircraft specfically to fight fires drops 15 thousand gallons every 5-10mins depending on where water sources are.
God bless the brave firemen and women
You said firemen first and then firewomen. Why??? Why not firewomen first? (Sarcasm)
FirePeople ! Geez
I’m not from Cali, I live in New England but thank you to these men and women. This is truly game changing fire fighting tech
Amazing. Thanks to the firefighters .
In 2004 San Diego was on fire and military planes stood by waiting to help but no one could authorize the planes to go up. San Diego learned after that. America is so lucky that we have made it this far. This fire fighter guy from Orange County needs to be heard.
Thank you for this story.
Thank you for your service- my house was spared by feet! The helicopters helped to save my Tahoe neighborhood and I had no idea about this awesome technology! More communication is needed and more tax dollars!!
Awesome to see these strategies being transitioned to civilian use. As a vet, I cannot explain the true joy and relief of hearing CAS (combat air support) up above. Hopefully those men and women will also experience this. Now all they need is to adapt (or completely change) the chain of command and command climate. Military isn't perfect, but compared to the civilian sector, it almost looks too agile and that's saying A LOT. I see the biggest problem not the age, but lack of consistently rotating command structure. Complacency kills and when you're in one job at one place, not only do you become stubborn, you view change as a direct threat.
very well said!
Ever noticed the ongoing use of exaggerations and macho language? Can't even talk normal about ordinary work.. Like absolutely everything is part of mortal combat. Immature and primitive mindset leading to abusive behaviour?
@@OmmerSyssel totally agree. Usually making up for something they lack. Too busy trying to prove something to compensate for their own insecurity of not experiencing what is often a romantization of something thats far from it. Sad bc while theyre playing gijoe in their head while sitting on their rear end.. theres real work that needs to be done right in front of them.
Common sense tells me you have night crew who are train for night and only them fly at night. This gives the day crew a break and gives you time to do maintenance.
Stay safe. 😢🙏
If we can put a missile into a window at night you would think it’s a no brainer to use that tech to fight wildfires. I imagine that night vision has advanced since I separated from the Army and it was very good back then.
Not even fire season yet and we are fighting fires. Each year it gets worse. I pray for our safety.
The new normal is a year round "fire season" and not just in California.
@@blaydCA not in all states or places. At least 5 states have year round fires. But the fire season has spread to the majority of states whereas, many never had a fire season and now do.
The arctic is on fire again as of 6 days ago. Antarctic has been burning since April. Both now have annual fires whereas they use to have zero.
What a fantastic Production. Thank You!!!
Something is wrong. Check out what happened with the Tamarack fire south of Tahoe. The USFS actually made a video of it as it started to burn, without doing anything to stop it. They could have gotten it out right away. The Dixie fire was absolutely horrendous. Was that, too, intentionally allowed to get out of control? Another entire town was lost, like Paradise -
Didn't you see the officials that prevented burn backs that could've meant these fires never spread
@@janeblogs324 I didn't catch that part, but I remember when the Tamarack fire started it looked pretty weird and many questions were justified.
This technology makes me very happy. Be safe out there
Although work has placed me throughout most of the contiguous U.S.of A. (Less Maine), been a SoCal “resident” for life… whatever the heck a “fire season” might have ever been several many moons ago, it’s definitely been YEARLY in SoCal this past decade +
Great video. The helicopter aspect dropped off when the infighting was reported. Everyone living in CA has always known, these fires don't have to go on so long, so big and could be stopped but... Oh never mind ;)
Strange. Even in fire service alone you get the "old timers" that are resistant to change. It's a new century/millennium. Technology is advancing. It's time to take it and use it for good for safety and for bettering a persons life. To sit around and not look for a BETTER way or fast and efficient way to fight these fires in 2022 is just stupid. Those people that resisted flying at night should be publicly shamed. Including the ones that did the infighting!
To my knowledge, they don't let fixed wing aircraft fly at night. Moving at 200 knots, they can't stop, hover, go up and down, and turn on a dime like a helicopter can.
Fighting fires with helicopters and fixed wing aircraft is dangerous enough during the day as it is. It seems we lose one or the other every couple of years. But if helicopters can fight fires at night relatively safely, I am all for it.
Thank you!! Exactly!
Bureaucracy gone mad with stubbornness. They need to understand how vital change is, especially when it has so much potential to save lives and property. Hope these guys are able to help out in Australia in your (very short) off season.. that would be great. Amazing tech, great to see it in use!!
My HEART ❤ 💙 is on fire 🔥 for this people THANK YOY 🥰😍
The bureaucracy comments ring true from a friend who worked for the forest service. There have been multiple fires in Monterey County, CA where the feds & state agency couldn't get their acts together & the public suffered the consequences as a result ... no matter what kind of PR spin that's put on it.
Finally getting smarter about this. Fighting Mother Nature is like fighting a war. Half measures won’t cut it. I hope they can be more successful every year.
The USFS and CalFire are both deathly afraid of poor visibility based on past fatal experiences with traditional equipment. They ground planes and helicopters during the day due to such events.
Forest firefighting under other than VFR will be ruled too high risk without CERTIFIED (under actual same firefighting conditions) assisted vision conditions. Personnel safety is their number one priority.
The USFS and CalFire don't have experience using night vision goggles as a vision aid. The military does, and that understanding can be learned by USFS and CalFire. And, yes, it should be learned by them for occluded visibility, introduced to them as a demonstration.
They will learn the necessary accompanying aircraft spacing rules to be safe using this assisted vision.
They will learn necessary terrain and associated object clearance rules to be safe using this assisted vision.
Night vision goggles are not flying VFR. It is an adapted vision IFR scenario.
Night vision goggles have superior sensitivity to infrared than do daylight imaging devices. So it can see well through smoke.
Night vision goggles do have a limitation seeing colder objects against a seemingly uniform fire background.
This limitation can be mitigated by adopting terrain/tall object vertical clearance rules, or by finding a way to eliminate this limitation.
- I have seen superimposed images used to advantage in other infrared imaging. FLIR ONE PRO adapter for iOS superimposes a high resolution daylight image on a lower resolution, slower updating infrared image. It's a powerful combination. There is no reason other imaging combinations could not be beneficial.
- Perhaps a LIDAR image superimposed on the night vision image can mitigate any limitation of night vision goggles. LIDAR detects cold and hot objects alike.
Other imaging methods can be tried in combination to find a sweet spot for safe vision under heavy smoke conditions that defy otherwise safely flying into a wildfire.
CAL Fire is already doing training for night ops. It doesn’t happen in a few weeks or days. It takes time. Besides they don’t even have their entire fleet fitted for it yet. It’ll happen but if they ain’t got the training then they ain’t saying yes to something they’re not trained in. Just being safe and responsible rather then neglecting the safety of others.
@@redboylegend1262 Just because they are not ready doesn't mean others are not. This is nothing less than political BS.
@@zam1012 this isn’t something you can just make a decision on the spot and say sure go do what you’re trained for… they don’t have a plan of operations for aircraft night ops. This meaning they need crews on the ground to be included on what’s going on. The crews on the ground stay out on the fire for 24hrs straight. There’s no let’s go back to base camp and see what’s night ops like. You’re talking about dozers, hand crews, engine crews, and then the scary part, contracted personnel on water trucks and dozers. On top of that you’re making yourself liable for someone else’s actions if you give the green light. It’s easy to say all fine and dandy from our POV but those decisions only the person saying yes is fully telling themselves they can take the blame if someone gets hurt or killed. Can you do that?? That’s something the public will never understand.
@@redboylegend1262 It's as easy as turning a light switch on.
@@redboylegend1262 Glad to see someone in these comments understands the complexity of fighting big fires. The #1 goal isn't protecting property, it's not losing lives.
Love our Chinook. Remember that SoCal fire in Oct 2020 that made headlines with 80K evacuated? Ever notice you never heard a followup? That's why.
It wasn't the only reason, mind: Irvine has extra-wide residential streets, a multi-lane parkway along the edge of the city serving as firebreak, and zoning that's so far kept residential neighborhoods away from the brush-covered foothills. But embers were blowing fire over the parkway into the city's fringes. The first night, our helicopter fleet mounted a massive attack and halted the fire all along the edge of town. 2 non-residential structures burned. Everyone was back home within 48 hours, once crews made sure all the hot spots were out.
Nobody deserves to lose homes, property, let alone their lives. But I hope Calfire, federal and state agencies can work on coordination so we're able to send our fleet to help less affluent, more spread-out rural communities as well as wealthy towns with centralized fire departments like Malibu and Tahoe.
Great reporting. Great story.
Outstanding really great to hear be safe out there crew Respect ✊🏼
Great video!
As a fire fighter along the Gulf Coast with a small volunteer fire department I unfortunately have lots of experience in dealing with the US Fish and Game and the Forest Service with the National Wildlife Refuges. Any time we had a brush/grass fire out at one of them we tried to get there and put it out before any of their people got there. Once their people got there what should have been a 30 min to 1 hour fire fighting operation always turned into a 6 hour to full day event. They have to have two of three levels of supervision involved, notify multiple agencies, make sure that all personnel on scene are properly trained and certified for the operation, spend an hour of two developing a plan, wait on what they consider the appropriate personnel and equipment to arrive, then they just MIGHT put some water in the fire. It also does not matter to them where the fire is, where it started, where it progresses to, what it's effecting, or anything else. If the fire touches, can touch, or has touched, the wildlife refuge they are in charge. No exceptions, according to them. They don't even care what our state laws say. I watched several fires that we could have put out when they were under 3 acres burn over 600 acres or more because of their BS when they would not allow us to attack the fire until they were ready. Many of the local fire departments/fire fighters didn't want to respond to any fires anywhere near the wildlife refuges. Only did because we had to when they were in our fire districts. Then volunteer response to those calls was usually low.
Move over Cal-fire and USFS let the hammer do the fire fight at night and day!!!
I felt our states biggest fire was in 2018 when the city of Paradise burned to the ground hospital & all. It felt like our whole stare was in fire. I live in/on Huntington Beach in Southern California. Paradise is 500 miles away but just to the North Malibu was burning, just to the East Riverside was burning, to the South San Diego was burning & in my backyard even Laguna Beach was burning. It was bad. It was scary our sky looked like night during the day, but at night there was an extra terrestrial red glow. The only thing that was that scary was the very first night of our first Covid lockdown. It was so quiet in our lively beach town equally dicey
This is amazing, we need to focus more resources on these types of things.
Just left N.Cali 3 days ago. It's surreal watching it ablaze now. We were just there! What a wierd feeling. I hope this fire is out out asap🙌🏾🙏🏿
I'd like to hear Brian Fennesey put this same energy into figuring out why his OCFA battalion chiefs did not even order aircraft until 15-30 minutes after arriving on scene of the Coastal Fire in Laguna Niguel a couple months ago. Their decision not to call South Ops to request Cal Fire aircraft was likely a major factor in the loss of over 20 homes that burned that day. Even when they finally did order aircraft, the order was grossly inadequate and the Cal Fire Air Attack was ultimately the one that directly ordered the much larger aviation response but an hour or so later than it could have been if OCFA had made the order right away. Their radio traffic is available on my channel.
As a lay person, 15 minutes doesn't seem like an inordinate amount of time to me...
@@mandyinseattle Aircraft should have been part of the initial dispatch. Consider also that they arrived about 15 minutes after the first report, meaning the aircraft order was placed 30 minutes after it should have been ordered. There was no chance of containing that fire in that terrain without aircraft.
Also consider that when they finally requested aircraft, they took only a standard order of 1 air attack and two tankers, which was grossly inadequate and led to substantial additional delay. When the Cal Fire air attack arrived 30 minutes after OCFA finally made the request for them, Cal Fire's air attack directly ordered 4 more tankers, a VLAT and multiple additional helicopters.
Either way, the result speaks for itself. Because of the delay, they weren't able to start making retardant drops until well after the fire was established in the steep, inaccessible drainage and pushing substantial ember cast into the residential area.
There was also significant delay in ordering strike teams for structure protection. They entirely underestimated the scale of that incident.
I was down the road at the beach when that fire started. I agree something wasn’t ordered correctly, those homes should not have burned. Not enough aircraft and not enough engines. Should have had a strike team of engines per home in my opinion.
If the authorities used management of the land properly there would be less fires.
the CH-47 are a very reliable helicopter i was flight engineering and crew member (chief ) of the A B C & super C now they have been remodeled to become D models believe me is a strong helicopter i still love them.
For fire fighting use, the payload capability is priceless. Plus even on the Ds, the avionics package can easily do night work.
'Inherent resistance to change' ? Open your eyes. Fire season in California used to be late summer to early fall. Now ? It's just about all year. The climate is changing. Fast. Better change the way you deal with it.
The climate has always changed. There were worse fires a hundred years ago.
The Great Fire of 1910 (there are a dozen more examples)
It was a hot, dry cycle, worse than now. Tree ring data shows 250 year droughts in the past.
The problem now? Putting fires out. Forests NEED to burn every 20 to 30 years as nature intended. That's how forests renew themselves. The fires don't grow into monsters.
Fire is being handled all wrong, start to finish.
@@TheBandit7613 Really ? Putting fires out is the 'problem' ? I'm guessing that if you lived in the forest (which a lot of people do these days) you'd have a much different opinion. If Calfire had let last years Caldor fire burn, it would have incinerated South Lake Tahoe. You're talking 30K people.
@@rhp__6691 Born and raised in Evergreen Colorado.
Doesn't get more "forest" than that.
It's too late for Let it burn now in many places.
So it's going to be more expensive.
Virtually all our forest problems are from putting fires out the last hundred years. A healthy forest that burns regularly, the fires are not that intense. Most mature trees survive. The underbrush burns and returns nutrients to the soil, tree spacing is optimal. The remaining trees are healthy enough to fight off attacks from Pine Beetles.
We watch this crap happen every year and blame it on "climate change" which is complete BS.
The forests are overgrown and unhealthy. Either we spend billions fighting out of control fires every summer for the next thousand years or we get the forests back in shape. Those are the only two options.
@@TheBandit7613 BS? It's not. It's not one or the other, both influence them. Increasing the overall surface temperature increases the evaporation rate, thus you have dryer conditions regarding soil which literally fuels fires. Combined with decreased rainfall (because of changing weather patterns which directly tie into gw/cc) the net results are what you are seeing: earlier forest fires, spread over a larger distance and happening more often. Cali isn't just dealing with those effects, the entire world is and that's why these als increase in frequency/duration and scale in places like Europe and South America.
@@sonicblue7real357 It's not hotter here.
Same as it always was. Death Valley's 120 year old record still stands.
All fairness to both agencies; great new technology very exciting to see an new initial attack capability, but I understand that extended tactics may need more training and experience with personal and new equipment.
My brother in Placerville was on evacuation warning for weeks during the Caldor fire. I was so nervous for him. This makes me angry that it was possibly unnecessary in how long it took to get it controlled and my brother’s life, along with others, being at risk unnecessarily as well.
i am so sorry
This is needed...the way wildfires are evolving..fire departments need new techniques that can help them and this idea is really a great upgrade
All the best to them 🤙🤙🤙
These billionaires that want to go to space and other planets need to wake
Up. This is it, we clean up earth, protect the environment, or its a wrap in 100 years.
Do like Howard Hughes did invest in the
Country's needs , a big upgrade in wildfire fighting aircraft, a nationwide fleet. Fires are only going to get worse,
Like hurricane and the tornadoes are.
@chip banks im suggesting that the scale and intensity of wildfires seems to have reached a point now that the methods of firefighting that they had in place for long is no longer effective which is why they are resorting to new ways so i would argue in that sense that wildfires are evolving...otherwise if it weren't they would not be in need for this upgrade...just a view.
And yes coconuts do migrate...if not by sea currents to where they take root at a place with favorable climate then they migrate with the people who migrate since they take the stuff with them.
@chip banks With a name like chip, this ridiculous question must be in jest.
Coconuts migration? No but tarantulas do.
@chip banks Not my name , just a CB
handle. U-tube bard my real user name,
Too much anger when The Clown Trumpy was pretending to run the country.
No, you're an environment-hater. These Chinook Helicopters must be banned immediately. They run on a petroleum-based form of diesel fuel. That's Fossil Fuel: the enemy of civilization that will bring on the mass destruction of humanity and the entire animal kingdom!!! Until these Chinook Helicopters are run on solar panels, they must be banned. Now!!!
Sounds like a battle over egos and funding.
Imagine the hundreds of thousands of square acres that burned only because of ego and infighting. just shameful 😞
But .. that's not what happened. A couple helicopters weren't going to extinguish that fire in a week.
I wonder how much the Story effected or Better yet Protected California. Seemed like every summer for the last 5 years we always had 2-3 of solid smoke from fires. Thank you for bringing this topic to light. Our summers have been much more Fire Free since
This is what happens if you don’t cut down trees. Forestry disservice is stupid.
Try to harvest lumber on a hill with no roads. It’s not cheap.
Where is the logic there? Trees keep water in the ground. We would have desert without trees. We need better forestry services at state and national level
@@ReviewBoard-uy5nv Yeah, and Cheeto Head won 2020.
@@ReviewBoard-uy5nv Farmers always re-plant for future harvests, logging is no different.
The title of this video should be: "Taking the fighting to the infighting between government agencies." 😂🤣
What amazes me is there still stuff left to burn. Night time the winds die down and the fire slows. Fighting at night is a great idea.
Amen!!!
I have seen - first hand - the benefits which would have materialized had night fire fighting (both air and ground) been allowed.
While there are exceptions, fires and winds typically diminish at night. Compared to the afternoon heat and winds, the difference can be VERY dramatic. With the latest weather forecasting, computer modeling of weather, terrain, moisture, night vision systems, and aerial command centers managing sky traffic, not only can fires be fought at night, but they can be done more safely than in the day.
It can be safer because the infrared night vision works better at night, enabling one to more easily identify spot fires which could risk enveloping fire fighters on the front line. It can also be safer at night if indeed, the temperatures are cooler, and both the fire and winds are less active. As mentioned here, fires tend to grow exponentially. Taking the nights off in firefighting just gives them another ~8 hours to grow, unchecked, so they're ready to take off as the next day's heat and winds pick up.
When the fires rage as long as they do...does it seem appropriate to start drilling water wells to support on the outskirts of these fires & provide perhaps an abundant water source...if fire continues or these wells were available throughout strategic places...seems possibly a forest fire sprinkler system linked to water wells or even underground storage cylinders/huge buried water or fire suppressing materials...foaming types or perhaps water guns & green water balloon cannons, hot air balloons with fire proof cable tied to amphibious autonomously controlled bot linked to a lightweight fireproof hose attached to water pump in well allowing it to "rain" until water source is dry or pump can't lift the water to the balloons altitude...I dunno, Willy Wonka sounding, but to have fires as long as we have & lack the ability to contain them...is realistically even more ridiculous. Gotta be an efficient way, with prior planning to end or significantly lessen the impacts of wildfires.
@@wesleytacy3935 Lots of interesting ideas. I've also wondered about balloons assisting, but the winds around large fires pretty well rule that out, as they often enough can't even fly close. The wells would be good. But in a lot of areas, the water table is either extremely deep or non existent. Just about anywhere in the west where the water table is known to exist, it has already been heavily tapped, with the water table dropping. Deep wells cost several hundred thousand dollars just for the drilling. Then there's the pump, running power lines or installing a generator or gas powered pump in remote areas, maintenance, and some security to prevent theft. I think costs would be the killer of installing a grid of wells in forests well outside of inhabited areas.
To see how costs can be the limiting factor, just look at California's primary energy supplier, PG&E. High winds caused their power lines to spark GIANT fires. The worst was the Paradise fire. It killed 85 people and destroyed 18,0000 structures mostly homes. Even before that fire, their lines had sparked major fires and they were ordered to both perform more maintenance as well as upgrade their grid. They simple don't have available what could cost as much as $100 BILLION dollars. If this laudable goal was to be realized in the next, say, 10 years, California taxpayers and electrical grid users would have to fork over an extra $10 BILLION, ANNUALLY in new taxes.
I think the same cost issue would exist with a large, complex grid of wells and pipelines within so many square miles where fire poses great risk.
@@gregparrott I would be willing to bet that there are certain areas that are far removed from traditional water sources that would benefit greatly from statistically placed water wells for the purpose of providing water for fires...as I see the disadvantages or inability to do so in other areas. I've heard there is a dry chemical that they drop from aircraft that is supposed to work in a way as smothering the fire, if something lightweight, somewhat fire resistant & naturally occurring in nature and ease of aerial application...then follow up with the water, rinse & repeat...it seems so easy, however the extremes of these fires raise the physics of the fire fight to beyond next level difficulty. Aerial drops of fire retardant bubbles that cling to each other & harden upon exposure to fire & create an oxygen tight seal...smothering the fire. How about harnessing the heat energy to power pumps...geysers erywhere...I'm a dreamer blessed with an imagination, far from an engineer, as I see the cup half full, some see it half empty & the engineer says the cup is twice the necessary size. Godspeed to firefighters & fire fighting advancements!
Seen a couple of these flying around yesterday on the Flightradar24 map. Head butting between local fire and the forestry service, why doesn’t this surprise me any. We are all working towards the same goal, at the end of the day it’s about life and property.
As they say, lives won’t be saved if it’s too expensive.
Brilliant!
Finally getting smart with putting out fires. Been thinking for decades that there has to be a better way. Too bad there has to be issues with people's nonsense in working together. Humans...ugh
Sad that in-fighting costs the property and livelihoods for the people they're supposed to be working for and protecting.
That Dixie fire was gnarly
These systems seems to be much more effective ! This is probably something other countries should have too !
Make buildings out of stuff which doesn't burn, make defensible space around buildings, and do prescribed burns.
I'm not sure when, it was after the late '70s, wildfire fighting became a 9-5 job. Start in the morning and be back at camp for suppertime. Prior, we (I was one of them) grubbed 24/7. You always made the best production after 10 PM and before 10 AM. Most of us like the night shift, it was a bit cooler and you could see easier. You could also get much closer to the "nose" of the fire and make more and better fireline.
I suppose, all the "safety and comfort" regulations is why things changed. It is good to see that they are reverting to a more productive course of action.
We need to address the sinking water table and desertification of land. Simple trench building and Re-greening practices will stop wildfires. It’s cheaper than buying helicopters and paying social security for those losing their homes or for rebuilding infrastructure
Agreed.
Perfect
I fought on the Dixie and Caldor last year on a California (R5) north ops hotshot crew. I quit this year because the pay is garbage and I didn’t really have a life.
They were using these type 1 chinooks last year too.
Tell us why you really quit. Was there foul play? Intentionally lit? Intentionally left to burn?
@@janeblogs324 calm down Becky
This year is much better they made big changes
Amen. Bless our Fire Fighters, EMS, Medical, Trauma, truly the hardest emotional toll a human can hold in their hearts...that's why I did my classes and excess clinicals, still...too much for me...I would have been a renegade and avenged the clear cases of child abuse and such...too much love and pain in my heart to do the job, I admire those that can and they deserve sooo much more...
Texas needs that for all the wildfires we are having in this hot dirty windy drought. They cut all the trees down here to build homes out in these hot dry fields. 100s & 100s every week.
Peace & Love to every firefighter!
mind blown that the status quo was to to call it a night on firefighting
Up here the fire fighter communications were limited and some lost "throttled" during a huge fire because Verizon wanted them to up their plan to make everything work correctly. We had trucks lost out in BFE with no idea what the situation was.
If the weather and fire winds allow night flights it is a tool that needs to be expanded. We learnt this in Australia. The fire fronts are visible despite the smoke. And every hour counts.
When I was doing that back in the late 90s/early 2000s, we would only joke about doing it at night...
Prolly looks awesome tho
im not even surprised any more
Wow! 2000 gallons per minute that Chinook can pump!!! If you don't know what exactly that means, that's a huge water pump, like huge
Cal fire has the largest aerial firefighting fleet in the WORLD. Most states have nothing.
A little perspective goes a long ways
Agreed, as evidenced from others states such as the recent New Mexico fires. California's tax base is better so more funding.
let's go boys!!!!!!! still miss my brother everyday
oh noooooo
The most powerful country in the whole World, the bigest air force with, It is unable to stop the California State Wildfires... What a shame!
They need well paid crews all year long to really deal with the problem of fires. Controlled burns in the winter time would probably actually work instead of getting out of control.
What a great tool the "thermal imaging camera' the easiest fire to extinguish is a small one.
Keep it contained and make it go back on itself.
🔥💧
so true...the fire service hates change.......
@ 8 minutes 41 seconds!!! That has been happening for years.
I worked for a contract fire department and seen this first hand.
It’s all about money and keeping it on one side. Keep it to the state or feds.
So disappointing. My contract fire department went do a fire with 5 water tenders 2 fire engines fully staffed and was turned away in Southern California because we’re a volunteer fire department. I think that’s what needs to be really reported all the feuding between the departments state and federal level and how they keep resources away so they can make more money for their agency’s.
The only reason they can't contain wildfire in countries like US is, the authorities don't want to.
It helps big businesses & Govts to acquire lands at low cost, lesser public resistance.
Nighttime fire ...could be just as bad as a windy day...it all depends on....wind speeds
And thermal belts at night.
Fire all of the bureaucrats, find some random people in the phone book, offer them half the wage and government benefits, and we'd have a much better world.
Doesn’t work when it wasn’t the bosses idea. I feel for Fire Cheif
Proper preparation prevents poor performance. Attacking the enemy at its weakest time.
Frightening!
The Fire Service: 200+ years of tradition unimpeded by progress.
Firefighters hate two things, change, and the way things are right now…
the infighting instead of cooperation is ridiculous... should think it was important to work together and get these fires doused asap
"Each fire is unique..." While I don't disagree, that to me sounds like a cop-out statement instead of an actual answer.