They can reach places quickly that ground crews cannot; and when the fire gets too hot for the ground crews, helicopter pilots can swoop in with buckets full of water to bring down the heat so ground crews can get their job done.
The Sweet Home Outdoor Events Center served as home to six helicopter contractors, who were helping fight the Canal Creek Fire, last week.
Their takeoffs and landings drew spectators from around town, and Friday, they were treated to an aerial exhibition as Krassel Heli-Rappellers personnel Adam Stark and Aaron Bell practiced rappelling.
“Yesterday, I don’t know how many came in,” said Debbie Newman, a spokeswoman from the Bureau of Land Management. In about three or four hours of counting Friday morning, she saw 30 to 40 visitors.
“The kids just love it,” she said. The pilots give them stickers and let them sit in the cockpit.
The pilots are there to support the ground crews, said pilot Ryan O’Herron, 31, of Bend. He is there to help keep things in check for the ground crew.
O’Herron works for Columbia Helicopters, based in the Portland area. He has spent five years with the company after working previously for three years with a small company in South Carolina.
When things get a little hot, he can cool it down, he said.
Sometimes it’s difficult for ground crews to reach the fire, he said. In this case, firefighters are coping with steep terrain, and it’s easier for the helicopters to reach it.
“The guys are getting in there on the ground,” O’Herron said. “They’re doing a jam-up job.”
The helicopters are a way to slow and stop fires, but “it’s intended to support the ground troops,” said Scott Nutt, a helicopter manager for the U.S. Forest Service. “We look at it as a tool in the toolbox for the firefighters.”
It is an expensive tool for use in a high-risk environment, Nutt said. The amount of knowledge pilots must have is significant, everything from terminology used to communicate with ground crews to fire behavior as well as their piloting skills.
They also sometimes get all the glory in the media, he said.
Both Nutt and O’Herron emphasized the importance of ground crews.
“These guys, they’re the ones doing the work, camping out on the fire lines and working the long days,” O’Herron said.
The helicopter mission is different from the air tankers, Nutt said. Usually air tankers are intended to establish a perimeter for fires by dropping retardant to slow the spread of fire.
The helicopter is usually dropping water right on the edge of a fire, he said. For a burnout, where firefighters are attempting to create a field of burned fuels that a fire cannot cross, the helicopters are used to drop water off the line to help prevent spot fires.
O’Herron pilots a dual-rotor Boeing Vertol 107. Beneath it is a 150-foot cable attached to a power head and bucket capable of carrying 1,300 gallons.
Four pumps installed beneath the bucket can suck water out of a water source only 18 inches deep and fill the bucket in less than a minute.
That isn’t as important for this area, he said, but in places like Texas, with limited water resources, it becomes critical.
Columbia had a crew of eight in Sweet Home last week. They included two command pilots, a copilot, a crew chief, two mechanics and two drivers. The flight crew consists of two members from among the two command pilots and copilot.
The Boeing helicopter is 83 feet 4 inches long with two General Electric engines capable of up to 1,500 horsepower each.
They combine for 2,200 horsepower on takeoff.
Each blade is 25 feet long, and the two rotors overlap each other and are synchronized to rotate in opposite directions to stabilize the aircraft.
The tail rotor in smaller helicopters is used to keep the aircraft straight, O’Herron said, but the tail rotor can use up to 25 percent of the helicopter’s available horsepower. The dual rotor system counteracts the same effect using a lower percentage of total horsepower.
O’Herron attended school in the Flight Technology Department at Lane Community College. After spending three years in South Carolina, he returned to Oregon to work for Columbia. Columbia helicopters are used for firefighting, logging, oil exploration and other types of work.
“I love being in the outdoors, being in the rural areas and doing some work that helps out,” he said.