Park Fire (Butte/Tehama County)

[mcjones2013]

I don't have any guidance on the fire operations, but for law operations in Butte County, from what I've been able to scan here in Sac, there's some patching occurring between different frequency bands for the the various outside agencies.

Patched together:
BCSO MAIN (VHF) - 154.725 (107.2)
BCSO MAIN (BRICS) - TG 1001 (may also be patched with BCSO SECURE 1, TG 1301)
UTAC42 - 453.7125 (156.7)
8TAC94 - 853.0125 (156.7)

I want to give props to whoever the COML for this region is. They always does a great job getting these patches up for these large-scale incidents that require outside law enforcement to come in.

 

[norcalscan]

The all-hazards COML's on the law side for that area (Yuba, Sutter, Butte) are the best of the best. I've worked with them multiple times on incidents and pre-planning. There are multiple fixed-gateways in strategic places that can be flipped on and/or steered and suddenly everyone can talk to everyone regardless of radio band. It's amazing what can be accomplished when egos and power trips are set aside and communications happen for the sake and passion of communications.

 

[norcalscan]

Pay attention to the ZONE differences at the top...

A thing about this fire is the size grew so fast it had multiple heads advancing into very separate population centers to the point multiple entire aircraft ops could (and needed to) operate. They had to zone out the two counties roughly north (tehama) and south (Butte.) Then just in those Zones it needed to be split even more and then traffic increased to the point of needing even more. So one air tactics freq per zone for any fixed-wing operations. Rotor Victors just one for Butte, but Tehama needs two, split roughly east and west/north. Normally briefing and TFR are the same, but with the amount of aircraft over the fire, TFR literally became just traffic control/routing/access around the fire. Briefing fell to yet another victor. And then the common A/G command vs tactical, which separates ATGS traffic with DIVS on Command, and then firefighters are on A/G tactical to work directly with helicopter on drop instructions ("can you hit this snag here to my 3 o'clock?")

 

[norcalscan]

Fire - command is CDF Command 2, tone 11 up at Alder Springs on the west side of the valley that covers Butte up the canyons very well. Tone 10 up on Inskip peak covers the entirity of Tehama. Tone 10 on Inskip fire lookout also took direct flame when the hill got burned over but it never missed a heartbeat. Ops was expecting to lose it at that critical moment, and it remained up!

They tried to put in a NIFC command system and it completely and embarrasingly failed at a very critical moment in the fire and abandoned them back to CMD2 mid-operating period, which in itself was a stressful mess. The COML is not green at all, so not quite sure what happened there. Bit off more than they could chew too soon, or the COMT's just weren't up to the challenge of tuning that system up. That's a growing problem as we lose more and more RF COMT's to folks that are more IT oriented and applianced-based without knowing what the knobs actually do.

Park Fire Tehama Zone is streaming on my feed.

 

[ke6gcv]

I can't find the IAPs for the Park Fire. Are they no longer kept in the normal repository?

 

[mcjones2013]

I can't find the IAPs for the Park Fire. Are they no longer kept in the normal repository?

The other fires in that repository this year have IAPs posted, so Park Fire's are either being withheld from that site or are being hosted somewhere else.

 

[ke6gcv]

The other fires in that repository this year have IAPs posted, so Park Fire's are either being withheld from that site or are being hosted somewhere else.

Now that you mentioned it, I can see that information being withheld.

Thank you!

 

[officer_415]

Fire - command is CDF Command 2, tone 11 up at Alder Springs on the west side of the valley that covers Butte up the canyons very well. Tone 10 up on Inskip peak covers the entirity of Tehama. Tone 10 on Inskip fire lookout also took direct flame when the hill got burned over but it never missed a heartbeat. Ops was expecting to lose it at that critical moment, and it remained up!

I was hearing command traffic a few days ago in Marin County, which was pretty surprising. Not sure if it was ducting, or if they were hitting a repeater closer to me with the same tone (maybe Copernicus or Mt Howell).

The other fires in that repository this year have IAPs posted, so Park Fire's are either being withheld from that site or are being hosted somewhere else.

Probably the IMT 3 or 4 Drop Box.

 

[norcalscan]

I was hearing command traffic a few days ago in Marin County, which was pretty surprising. Not sure if it was ducting, or if they were hitting a repeater closer to me with the same tone (maybe Copernicus or Mt Howell).



Probably the IMT 3 or 4 Drop Box.

I too was hearing the traffic Monday while in the east bay. Surprised me at first but then realized it was just one-sided aircraft I was hearing, so they were likely hitting Copernicus Peak, which would be line of sight for the aircraft; maaaybe a 50 or 110watt mobile perfectly on Cohasset Ridge on the south end of the fire too.

IAP's haven't moved. IMT boxes. I won't post directly here but indirectly you can go to wildfireintel.org forums and find them there in the incident threads.

 

[avascan522]

That's a growing problem as we lose more and more RF COMT's to folks that are more IT oriented and applianced-based without knowing what the knobs actually do.

So is the state looking for more RF comm techs? That's an intriguing position. I've seen a couple Youtube videos from guys that do that professionally and it seems like a great job. Would love to look into that one day.

 

[norcalscan]

Go to CalCareers and search for Telecommunications. Look for results from CalOES. There's an Analyst II position open now which is right into this world. Once in as a tech, you'll want to apply internally for IBT - Incident Based Technician. Pass that test/training and get in the rotation for COMT assignments on fires, which can be 530am to 10pm days, with 5000calorie meals provided, usually a hotel, but sometimes a tent and sleeping bag, and an occasional helicopter trip to a mountain top.

 

[firephoto29]

Does anybody have any information regarding tac's and such (for ground operations) in the Tehama/Northern zone of the incident?
Thanks!

 

[officer_415]

Does anybody have any information regarding tac's and such (for ground operations) in the Tehama/Northern zone of the incident?
Thanks!

CDF T20
CDF T21
VFIRE 24
NIFC T1
NIFC T2
NIFC T3