WILDLAND FIRE SUPPRESSION NEEDED: INITIAL-ATTACK SUCCESS

1. WILDLAND FIRE SUPPRESSION NEEDED: INITIAL-ATTACK SUCCESS Presentation by Frank Greulich 1

2. AIRTANKER RETARDANT DROPS 2 3 4 5

3. MODEL OVERVIEW • A spreadsheet based procedure for estimating airtanker initial-attack performance • Exceptional precision and flexibility in specifying the spatial distribution of fire starts • Exact flight-distance moments are computed and then applied in a user friendly model

4. COST ESTIMATION EXAMPLE • Use of Dobson's data (1965) to estimate the cost of the Canadair CL-215 for "one-strike initial-attack" as described by Hodgson and Newstead (1978) and McDonald (1979).

5. DOBSON’S DATA • Cost = 1.15 + 0.0891 Dist + 0.0449 Dist2 • Where cost is given in cents per litre of airdropped water and Dist(ance) is the one-way flight distance from the airbase to the fire in 100’s of kilometers

6. ONE-STRIKE INITIAL-ATTACK • In the “one-strike initial-attack” model for skimmer aircraft it is assumed that it will drop water scooped from nearby sources until refueling becomes necessary thus ending initial-attack by that particular aircraft.

7. MODEL ANALYSIS A Microsoft Excel program is used to analyze the airtanker initial-attack model - Existing airbases can be evaluated - The optimal airbase location can be identified - Constrained optimization of airbase location may be done

8. INITIAL-ATTACK REGION - 1st EXAMPLE

9. MODELLING RESULTS - 1st EXAMPLE

10. GENERATING MODEL RESULTS 6 Define the regions with bounding line segments Assign fire occurrence probabilities to each region Locate the airbase if appropriate Enter the constraint(s) if appropriate Run the Excel program and examine results

11. INITIAL-ATTACK REGION - 2nd EXAMPLE

12. MODELLING RESULTS - 2nd EXAMPLE

13. COMPARATIVE ADVANTAGES - Generates exact moments of the flight-distance distribution - Models areas, lines and points as possible fire-start locations - Provides exceptionally fast computational speeds including optimization - Employs a commonly available and familiar spreadsheet program - Offers high internal consistency due to its programming simplicity - Is solidly based on analytical procedures vetted through refereed-journal articles

14. MODEL DEVELOPMENT - NEXT PHASE • Front-end for GIS data importing • Excel macros for data formatting • Scaled-up proof-of-concept run

15. REFERENCES CITED • 1.Dobson, N.R. 1965. "The economics of the Canadair CL-215 in the waterbomber and passenger transport roles." Canadair Ltd., Montreal, Quebec. OER-452. 13 p. • 2. Hodgson, M.J. and R.G. Newstead. 1978. “Location-allocation models for one-strike initial attack of forest fires by airtankers.” Can. J. For. Res. 8(2):145-154. • 3.McDonald, C.S. 1979. “Air tankers in Alberta.” In: Proceedings of the International Fire Management Workshop, Oct. 31 – Nov. 1, 1978. D. Quintilio (ed.), Edmonton, Alberta. Northern Forest Research Centre Information Report NOR-X-215. 89 p.

16. PICTURE CREDITS • 1 John McColgan, Fairbanks, Alaska • 2http://www.photos.blm.gov • 3http://www.srh.noaa.gov • 4http://www.for.gov.bc.ca • 5http://www.or.blm.gov • 6http://envweb.env.gov.ab.ca