I wish I could be the nations forest fire tzar. Who to contact? All I can say is their methods do not work, Ca history on fire fighting is dismal. These small toys okay for that ground, but what do they do when good size trees are involved. And really this is 2025 and they have vulnerable exposed hydraulic hoses, on a fire dozer? Sorry when it comes to dozer fire fighting I have not ever seen them actually attempt to fight it.
Didn't watch the video but have worked plenty of fires. Dozers are part of the toolbox. The other parts are fire engines, hand crews, and aircraft. Those D6s and D7s are what is needed for fast response and fitting in between rocks and trees. We are not pushing down trees. We are clearing grass and brush just a few inches deep. When you have whole forest involvement, you get a fleet of dozers and make a line way out ahead of the fire. Then crews on foot later burn back toward the fire when conditions are right. I have been on a few fires with D8 and larger size machines. They do OK in wide open spaces but mainly they are just a bull in a china shop that can't maneuver and fit between obstacles and stuff. Nearly saw a guy flattened when a wide U-blade clipped a thin tree and made it smack the ground so fast, it was amazing. Fell way faster than a tree on its own.
Here I think dozers are mostly used for making a fire break 3 or more machines wide. That's what they were trying to do on the fire that went through my property in 2010. The fire was so big the fire breaks were useless.
Most of the time around here fires are small. A dozer is on the initial call to a fire along with fire engines and hand crews and helicopters. If the fire needs a half mile of line 1 blade wide (or less) the dozer will do it way quicker than a crew of 20 men can do it with hand tools. Around here all fires in summer are wrapped with some kind of bare earth line so that if anything is skunking around in the ground, if it pops up it will not cross the line. Fire engines and aircraft are for slowing the spread, dozers and hand crews are for stopping it dead, bare soil is what is needed.
Every fire is different of course, but here we use a dozer or grader to put in a break, usually only one blade wide, well in front of an approaching fire, then have a ground crew burn back from that. A dozer then makes easy work of patrolling the break pushing any trees or piles of timber that have caught alight. A D6 size tractor is usually plenty big enough.
Yup like I say they don't try to put out the fires. 1 cat to make the trail or break. 50 more to fight the fire. Would love to get to prove it. So stupid that they let it grow and not attack fast, especially the real easy ground and grass fires. The fires are fought by environmental nut cases, that care nothing about all the critters that are killed by them.
I had a Daughter hosting her boy friends parents who were evacuated from this fire and she was on notice to move as well . A mate of mine was posted to fight the fire along with his crew and their truck . There was a lot of material on the ground from past logging and thinned pines . Needing tracks good enough to take their truck to areas that had caught from cinders . They had a D8K attached to them for access . First controlled by air then drowned by hand . They were pretty keen on the operator and his tractor . Fire breaks are pretty much useless when the breeze is blowing and are the strip to bury the cinders when the fire is under control . That fire gave a few people a fright . Its listed as one of 2 biggest fires in NZ , it was not and not by a long way . Pigeon Valley Fire - Wikipedia en.wikipedia.org
The fire I had the flames were 30' above the spruce tree's and the embers would blow 30' or more and start the tops of those tree's on fire. I'm not sure even a 100' wide fire break would stop that. Large fires create their own wind which makes them way worse and the wind can change directions too. They're called wildfires for good reason. They aren't easy to get under control.
It's kind of frustrating when people from out of the area pop up and say we don't fight the fires when every fire has hundreds to thousands of men working 16-24 hour shifts, eating camp food and sleeping in the dirt. When there are generations of people who have done this same work. The pity is that it is harder to get in ground floor and do a couple seasons as an irregular/militia type, the pay used to be pretty good, but it has not kept pace, and some departments seem to want everybody through an academy, when it used to be a weeks worth of classes and you were good to go as a rookie. It's a fun job, I liked it when I was younger. There are also Cat skinners pushing 80 still working fires, looks almost like congress in the heavy equipment section sometimes.
That's because the kids will never be allowed to do what those old boys did to learn the ropes, and you don't get good by watching YouTube or going to the Union Hall for class.
A lot of wildfire crews here are from reservations. I don't think they get paid much but the reservations get money. They are extra thorough putting out hot spots and hard workers.
So explain how many of the collection of dozers are teaming up and pushing into the fires? Using that technique the fire break should be miles wide. Problem is "they" like fires more than cleared burnt trees and brush. Equipment is the only way to fight the fires, dirt works great. Planes etc for jumped spot fires. I have dealt with fires alot back in the good old 95 degree summers when we burned the clearing trash. We didn't putt around looking at it we dove right into the flames. The boss could not afford a huge wild fire. Rule to fighting fire, see flames put them out. And goes for when your clothes catch fire when welding too.
Must have been some pretty tame fires if you could push right into it. Try that on some of the ones we've had the last decade and you'd be ash before the flames get to you.
I remember back in my early lowbed days 1978 and on, the central coast in Santa Maria, whenever there was a fire, every D-8 in the county would be dispatched. The terrain which was a lot of brush, scrub oaks and scattered oak trees which allowed for 3-4 D-8s to build a wide break. Every lobed outfit had a contract with the USFS and trucks were paid 24/7. By the late 80s it went to 12 on and 12 off and many didnt renew contracts. USFS quit using the big machines as they tore up the "environment" too much. D-6s were the normal size machine from then on.. The 8s were hard to move into the back roads too. Up here in the hills, the D-6 size machines are used exclusively. Easy to move and they are quick getting around in the trees.
I had a neighbor who was burning some brush piles. He had an older D6 dozer he was using to push brush into the burning piles. He must have never cleaned the engine or drive train. Some embers caught it on fire. He was lucky he drove it into a stock tank and got the fire out.
Dozer on fire edge is used where possible. Mostly this means grass. In tall brush and timber that would be suicidal. Also you don't ever push dirt onto burning material. Now you have burning material insulated by dirt. It does happens sometime. That has to be picked apart by the Cat and by hand, and thousands of gallons of water dumped into it to be sure it is dead out, after the main fire is done. If this does not get done that burning wood can skunk around under there for months, and erupt into a new fire later when everybody has gone home.
Tame fires, tell that to Red Adair. No couldn't have some idiot operators doing it. Just like all operating its the technique used. Oh its best to send picks and shovels in to do the job.
No way they could have used dozers to fight the fire that went through my property. When flames are jumping 30 feet or more above their heads putting a dozer in there is a suicide mission. An idiot from the county sent 3 dozers into my property that was so full of smoke they couldn't even see jumps and berms on my MX track. They had to back out when the flames went right over them. Years later one of the dozer operators did some land clearing for me. He said my track probably saved their lives because it gave them somewhere to back on to that was cleared and then they followed it back to parking area where I was spraying a 5th wheel trailer and the grass using my 2000 gallon water truck. I heard it was over $10mil. to fight the fire. I agree if you could push the tree's and bush into the fire it wasn't nearly as intense as the wildfires here. There were 2 planes deploying foam, 2 or 3 helicopters carrying water baskets to put out spot fires and 4 Air Tractors. The dozers were of no help after the fire easily jumping the fire break they made.
Not sure what the experiences of other are, but these days in my area I find there is a huge amount of general incompetence in those full time bureaucratic types that take control of the larger fires. I feel they like to play fireman with the bit shiny hat. In saying that we generally never get those sorts of fires that happen elsewhere in the world.
Here Sustainable Resources takes over when it's declared a wildfire. They are really good at organizing the fire fighting. The fire boss ripped a new one for the guy from the county that sent the dozers into the heavy smoke with flames just behind them.
Same with Fort Mac in '16. There was no stopping that and it was moving faster than a man could run through the brush. All they could do was push fire breaks into the treeline from the greenbelt behind people's backyards. Taking it head on was not an option. I could feel the heat from it across 5 lanes of traffic, a ditch and the center median. Not unbearable at that distance but I couldn't imagine getting closer than that.
No fire would jump my fire breaks. That is why they can't be a blade width wide.
Around here a fire will jump a 4 lane interstate with a sizeable median in a heartbeat. Fires are different in different parts of the world. A tractor and disc are the best tool in the tool box to fight fires here. A dozer of any size would just be an obstacle to drive around.
The famous Chicago fire jumped a river. The fire I went through probably would have jumped a 500' fire break. Spruce tree's burn like nobodies business. The flames were probably 150' high. Get a wind and the hot embers could probably blow a 1/4 mile or more.
It is common for fires around here to start up new spot fires a mile ahead of the main fire. But the sheets of flame will jump a 6 blade wide fire break sometimes too. And it can take days to put in a 6 blade line. Sometimes they do put 6 blades in anyway. All depends on the situation.
That is where you need the aircraft dumping. Depends on how bad they all want the fire out. Like in Ca the fire breaks to protect everything should be done days before the fire gets there. Miles wide fire breaks. Then flying maybe 3000 feet high water only spray bar drops over all populated areas to make rain, and water everything like rain would.
There are not enough dozers in the whole Western states to do that, nor enough fire aircraft in the whole world. Besides there are houses there. They don't want to be part of a mile wide fire break.
Yeah, if only they had crystal balls and could know days in advance of a wildfire coming through the area. Maybe they should just bulldoze all the forested area's down. I think this thread has run its course.
Or brush them out with clearing rakes. And no forests near big housing developments. I like the not enough aircraft, why is that? Because they would not allow the good old piston fire planes that were used in the 1960's into the 90's or so to do the job any more. Mainly all because of the Hawkins & Powers TURBINE powered C130 wings folding up on a pull out and of course killing all on the plane. This forced many large wild fire fighting aircraft owners out of the business. Hmm sounds like that was the plan. Strange how there have been many helicopters crash during wild fires, but those contracts haven't been canceled. Even the big martin mars planes are now not allowed and live in a museum. I bet the fuel consumption on the Mars was a small fraction of those tristars and 747's they now use, plus the mars could skim lakes etc to reload the water.
How many acres do crop dusters do in an hour or so? Thats one small plane. Guess they shouldn't have scrapped all those B17's and B29's. Wild fires should be considered an emergency, and all oversize road permits stopped. And let pilots that can handle the job do it, by passing some idiotic regulations. But naaaa its all very highly regulated and proves the lack of desire to put them out. NOT ENOUGH AIRCRAFT IN THE WHOLE WORLD? How many flights in the us on a normal day? I'm seeing that answer and 45,000. Okay?
This argument is stupid but I will reengage B17s were used on fires a lot, but they are long gone now P2s were the last piston planes to soldier on but all attritted out now, the airframes were just too old. You can't just commandeer any old plane from an airfield, who is going to weld up a tank and make sure it works? I said not enough firefighting aircraft in the whole world. There only exist a few dozen of them. And most of them are busy. Lots of air tankers have crashed, seems like one every couple of years at least right up to the present time. Not just that one C130 in Nevada.
I agree this is a stupid argument. Air Tractors are specifically designed for scooping up water and are piston powered. Aircraft can't be used if the smoke is too thick though. It would be virtually impossible to brush out the all the forest area's with clearing rakes. Canada has a lot more large forested area's with less population and is also one of the world's largest suppliers of lumber. You can't have lumber with trees and forests. When you have trees and forests wildfires are inevitable.
Yup logic gets stupid. Its why it is what it is now.
It doesn't need to be windy for "spotting" to happen. Embers or "branding" are lofted thousands above the ground when the hot air rises. Think; airplane cruising altitudes. Wind speeds double at tree top altitude. Depending on the type of fuel, a really large body of water, (miles wide) wouldn't make a good fire break. One other factor on effectiveness of firefighting, is putting yourself out of a job. If the fire goes out your job goes away. Most people on the job, do a good job and are effective and efficient. The politicians are the ones who don't want the fire extinguished.
Good post. And the last sentence is on the $. Reason 1 for that is it supports "climate change" nicely. And funny how the only heavy aircraft now allowed have to be the ones that consume the most fuel while doing the job. Recip jobs no longer allowed.
The parts for the propliners are no longer available. The vast NOS collection of WWII engines is gone. I know some of what went on in fire service bombers and at corrosion corner in Miami. By the ‘80s and ‘90s the poorly maintained last vestiges of radial engine bombers and transports had become great ways to earn a closed casket funeral, especially when you combine the dangers of aerial firefighting and ancient aircraft. It’s not a conspiracy it’s simple facts- metal fatigue, corrosion, and poor maintenance put the radial engine large aircraft to retirement.
The P2Vs soldiered on until just a few years ago but the rest of the recips went away in the early 2000s. But there were other problems with C130s and P3s etc. that really had us down to near nothing by the late 2000s, airframes all not flyable any more and too much bureaucracy on the Fed level to approve any new types. Except the State of Ca does not have to listen to them (as much) they turbine engined their fleet of formerly recip S2s and the Feds called on them heavily for a while. But S2s are small. That corner has turned now, there is a lot of new blood. First it was BAE146, then the DC10 came on scene, thought to be crazy at first but did quite well once they learned how to use it. Even a 747 for a while, I got to witness it take a lap around my house at a couple thousand feet, unfortunately it was not profitable and is now gone. Large Air Tankers and Very Large Air Tankers (LAT and VLATs) have proven much more cost effective for initial attack even at their high rates, than letting a fire get off to the races and burn hundreds of homes and have to set up fire camp for weeks with all the dozers and trucks and green beef sandwiches tobacco spit that comes with that operation. Now they have Dash 8s, several DC10s, newer C130s, MD87s, 737s, and a number of single engine Air Tractors.
Only the inlines are pretty much gone. Hundreds of Radials still around. Everts still flys DC-6's with 4 R-2800 on wing. Still many rebulders for them in the US. No lack of parts for any plane we still have metal and machine tools. And good old PMA.