CHAINING...are you ready?

340 homes lost (all 7 active fires in CO) as of 0700 local!

they didn't break down what the Spring fire was separately....but the aerial pictures were horrendous...complete subdivisions gone!

 

Aircraft wouldn't have been an option in the first 48 hours of that blaze...the proximity to the mountains/foothill/canyon system The Springs is constructed on, with 65mph gusts...air attack was out of the question. Before the winds became a factor, the initial attack was going good at containment according to reports...but once those winds kicked up...the fat lady went back for another banana split.

 

Doesn't surprise me one bit!

I was up in Portland earlier this week, and a big deal on the radio was the fact that the super air tanker...737 or 727, whatever it is...is just sitting on the tarmac pilot and crew ready to go, but since there isn't an agreement between OR and CO, the plane must sit until the "estimated bill" is paid before departure. In the same report, the USAF has a dozen converted C-130's sitting in UT at Hill AFB ready and waiting for some fires to work...but restricted by government agreement for use in UT/NV/ID.

MAKES NO SENSE AT ALL!!!!!!

 

NO it actually makes no sense at all!

Before becoming a trucker I was with Diamond Springs El Dorado FD, also still have my active Green Card for Air Attack/Dispatch with USFS. I completely understand the requirements of Mutual Aid and the extent that these agencies go for this issue. CO has no Mutual Aid agreements with any bordering State, not even WY, yet CO firefighters routinely fight fires in WY without the need of any Mutual Aid agreement in some file cabinet.

At the moment the USAF Academy was put on alert for evacuation, this fire went from local/regional jurisdiction to Federal jurisdiction. The Federal jusrisdiction has the capacity to call in at least the C-130's from Hill...for that aircraft, and the facilities of fuel and resupply of retardent in place at the Springs airport...it was a 2 hour flight from Ogden. At least 3 birds should have been pre-assigned and put enroute to the event...it is easier to turn equipment around than to throw precious time away waiting for initial dispatch to any incident.

Katrina was the biggest wake up call the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has ever been hit with! They, as usual, are a reactive agency, not a proactive agency...and they didn't learn then. The two biggest blunders that they still haven't addressed or prepared for is communication and logistics.....there are still 9, fully loaded, 53' dry vans (Swift) of water sitting outside of New Orleans....Swift is still collecting $300.00 a day for "storage" from FEMA...communication...there are currently 25 different modes of communication (radio) used by EMS agencies coast to coast...yet at Katrina there was no coordination of communication systems. Two or more agency staff/equipment units could not communicate with each other nor with the logistics command or the local/regional incident commander. Tak about a Cluster Phluck....sorry I used the wrong consonants and in a strange ordeer!!!!!