Firefighters Ready Aerial Arsenal for Brush Fire Season

Plotting a brush-fire defense much like the military plots a war, the Los Angeles County Fire Department has assembled an arsenal of firefighting aircraft.

Standing by for duty are four leased “initial attack aircraft,” as the department puts it, plus a fifth water tanker shared with the National Forest Service.

New to the arsenal this year is a Sikorsky Firehawk helicopter, a civilian version of the military Blackhawk, which the county is testing as a possible replacement in its fleet of smaller, water-dropping helicopters.

The UH-60L Firehawk, while hovering over any water source, can siphon up 1,000 gallons of water in seconds. The department’s standard helicopters have a capacity of only 360 gallons and must land to reload. The Firehawk also can be converted to transport more firefighters, emergency workers and victims than the department’s own fleet of helicopters, officials said.

All that air power is designed to avert a repeat of devastating firestorms in the region, like the ones in 1993 that raged from Newhall to the sea.

Faced with what many fear could be one of the worst fire seasons in recent history during the next several months because of El Nino-fueled brush in the hillsides, county supervisors in August approved a $3.2-million budget for aerial assaults on wildfires.

“The combination of increased air attack, improved pre-planning in high-risk areas and the brush clearance program has proven successful in terms of life and property protection,” wrote county Fire Chief P. Michael Freeman in an August memo to supervisors.

Other fire departments, both locally and nationally, are expected to monitor the county’s war against fires this season, evaluating the performance of each of the aircraft to determine which they might use for their own firefighting.

That attention has fueled lively lobbying and public relations campaigns by aircraft manufacturers and contractors. The official debut of the local air arsenal is expected Thursday, although details have not yet been disclosed.

All the leased aircraft, with the exception of the Firehawk, are based at Van Nuys Airport, including crews and support personnel. The Firehawk is based with other county fire helicopters next to Whiteman Airport in Pacoima.

The cost of leasing the Firehawk for about the next three months is $600,000, officials said.

Other equipment includes two SuperScoopers--planes that swoop down to a lake, reservoir or the ocean to scoop 1,620 gallons of water each time.

The county allocated $1.5 million to the final year of a five-year agreement with the manufacturer, Bombardier Aerospace of Canada, and the government of Quebec, whose fire season differs from Southern California’s.

After a bidding war between two companies, the county in August signed a $690,000 contract for the exclusive lease of an Erickson Air-Crane helicopter, which can deliver 30,000 gallons of water or retardant per hour and refill its 2,000-gallon tank in 45 seconds, Erickson company officials said.