KatieTheKat

For a little while there, it seemed the whole fire season might just pass me by and I'd be a wildfire fighter who never fought a fire.  But it is not so anymore.

First step was to pass the physical test so I could get back to work after being away for 2 months on medical leave.  Thanks to all my training and muscle strengthening in the Occupational Rehab program (OR1), I was able to pass the test by a pretty significant margin, at 13 minutes and 14 seconds (if it had taken me longer than 14min 30sec, I might be back at OR1 now).  It certainly didn't feel easy or guaranteed while I was in the middle of the test though!  Such intense suffering I have very rarely subjected myself to.  Again I found myself thinking as I huffed back and forth over that ramp with that massive hose pack on my back that I would likely fail and would have to come up with a new plan.  Then there was the intense burn in the quads connected with the simulated charged hose drag.  It felt like I could not possibly have the power in me to do the second lap, yet somehow I succeeded.

That first day there were no fires (well actually my crew was out in the morning when I arrived and struggled through my test, but no fires for me!).  Nor did anything exciting happen on day 2.  Even though it is so hot and dry, it was feeling rather like it did back in May when we had no fires at all.  Though this time there was a barbeque at the base and also I came back on "reds" and mod standby.  Reds means that from noon until 8pm, we are expected to be at the base and ready to lift off in a helicopter within 5 minutes of getting a call.  Mod standby further means that from 6am-12midnight (24:00) we are on call and expected to be able to get in a helicopter or truck within 20 minutes of receiving a call.  So Day 2 I stayed at base over my lunch hour and an extra hour and a half beyond my normal working hours of 10:30-6:30, but otherwise it was just a normal day at base.  We did some painting.

Day 3 was yesterday.

Day 3 I woke up around 8am and puttered about my morning.  I wasn't immediately hungry and I had showered the night before (painting in coveralls is sweaty work!) and anyhow I still had lots of time before work, so I was just lazing around a little.  Well I was sorry for not having put together some breakfast sooner when I got a call at just after 8:30am - my first fire!  I grabbed some granola bars and zipped up to the base.  I was the first one there out of my crew (luckily there were already officers around and the gate was open since I'm not sure how long it would have taken me to remember the alarm code and the fact that I had a key to the base on my keyring).  Soon the rest of the Coast Whiskey  crew arrived and we loaded into the helicopter.

In the helicopter

Already we had learned that what we were headed for was likely just a campfire on the beach over on a small island across the bay from Sechelt.  Sure enough, about a 5 minute helicopter ride later, we were circling over a contained fire pit on a rocky beach as my crew leader radioed in his report.




People started to appear on the beach and when we landed and unloaded all our gear, Josh went over to talk to them.  Neil and I watched from the sidelines as they chatted and then we saw the people take buckets to the ocean in order to douse the fire.  Meanwhile our helicopter had headed back to base since the landing site wasn't very good.   Once the fire was out, we were invited over to have a seat and chat with the very friendly people who were responsible for the fire.  Turns out they happen to live in an area that ought to be in the Sechelt district fire zone (and therefore would not have had a fire ban in place).. but they are unreachable by the municipal crew (being on an island) and therefore should have been following our rules which means no fires due to a fire ban.  So they were trying to obey the fire restrictions but were misinformed.  We had a good chat and waved goodbye when our helicopter came back.  In the end, we made it back to our base just in time for our normal workday to start at 10:30am.

Not exactly much of a forest fire.

So it was sort of a good thing that in the early afternoon we got another call (sadly just before lunch, for which I was expecting to prepare myself a tasty salad).  This time it was a report of smoke on the Sea-to-Sky highway side of Anvil Island.  Back in the chopper and off we went.


We found the fire and again made some passes over it while Josh radioed in his initial report and we dropped some ticker tape out of the window to mark the location from above (somewhat unsuccessfully).  Now we had to think about the logistics... and a significant one in the case of coastal firefighting is how tides will affect your helicopter landings and gear stagings.  There was a little beach not very far from the smoke, so we figured we should be able to hike in to access the fire reasonably easily (provided it wasn't at the top of the cliff).  But we also needed water and that meant filling up our Stillwells (basically big pyramid-shaped dry bags that hold a lot of water).  And we needed to put them somewhere while we hiked in so that the helicopter could pick them up and sling them in to us.  The little beach wasn't going to last long enough, given the advancing tide.

So we flew around some more...

That little cove was our landing spot and the start of our hike in... unfortunately, it only had a beach with space for a helicopter at low tide.

We decided to land on a larger beach, pump some water into the stillwells, have the helicopter sling those and most of our gear to a non-beachfront staging area, and then have the helicopter drop us off for our hike.

Helicopter on the beach with stillwell-filling station behind and above the tide line.

Pump to move seawater up to the stillwells.  I had to keep moving it up the beach as the tide came in.

Neil and Josh admiring the view while the helicopter moved our gear to the higher staging area.

The hike was tiring but not too difficult.  We stopped to flag our path along the way.  And after not too long, we found our fire.  Luckily, it was below the cliffs.  We judged it to be about 10 by 15 metres.  There were small patches of visible flame but mostly just smoke.

Forest Fire

The next step was to assess the area for "Danger Trees" - anything leaning or burned or with broken branches that might pose a hazard to us while we worked.  There were a couple - a little one with burned out roots right in the middle of the fire and a large one with dead limbs well off to the side.  Since we didn't have a chainsaw with us and they weren't major hazards, we just decided to stay clear of them.

No chainsaw.  That was a bit of a problem.  We needed a place that the helicopter could bring our gear to, but the canopy was thick and there weren't a lot of openings.  Luckily, Neil hiked up and found us an open boulder that had a clearing above and enough space for the slingload of gear, but was not suitable for the stillwells.

A real firefighter, waiting for a helicopter to bring in her gear.

We had our helicopter pilot (Matt) bring over the gear and undertook the tricky task of transferring it closer to our fire site off the boulder and over steep and difficult terrain.  The first thing we brought down was the chainsaw, with which Josh proceeded to fall a couple of trees closer to the fire in a place where we could set up the stillwells.  Once the coast was clear (ie. trees were not being felled), Neil and I brought everything else over.  I got a nasty wasp sting in my thigh in the process.

It got really red and itchy the next day.

By this time, time was getting on.  While the helicopter went to refuel (the pilot can't carry a full tank and all our gear with summertime temperatures since he doesn't get as much lift in warmer air), we got to work in setting up the pump and some hoses to put some water on the hot spots.  We knew we didn't have a long time to spare before "grounding time", so we worked quickly.  We had about 20 minutes to lay down some water, then we quickly slung up all our gear and had it ready for Matt when he came back with the helicopter.  A quick run/hike down to the beach for a hover entry since there was no beach left at this time, and we were off with ample time to make it back to our base before dark.

Once we got back (around 8:30pm), we weren't done yet.  We still needed to tune our chainsaw, flush the salt water out of our pump, hoses, and stillwell, refill our fuel tanks, and ensure our gear was ready to go for the next morning when we agreed to meet at 7am.

I got home, exhausted, pretty hungry, sweaty, and filthy sometime close to 10pm... first day of firefighting complete!


I don't think I have the energy just now to write about the second day (that being today).  Here are some pictures instead...

There's our little cove again.  Tide was high so we had to do a hover exit onto that rocky point.

First we filled our stillwells on a nearby beach.

Fire's still burning.

Unfortunately it's impossible to tell how muddy I am.  And this is before I really started getting up to my armpits in the dirt and rocks.

Fire site... all done!

So, things have been a little quite on the firefighting update front, and there's a good reason for that!  Perhaps I should explain here..

My last post was about hover exit training, but what I didn't mention is that I nearly missed out on that altogether.  The night before, I was struck by intense pain in my lower back and right hip resulting in poor sleep and a lot of difficulty doing things like getting out of bed and putting on my shoes.  I decided to go ahead with hover exit training despite the pain since I didn't want to miss it and I don't think it made things any worse. 

Despite seeing some doctors and physios and such that weekend and in the following week, things didn't get much better so the decision was made that I would need to go on medical leave.  The rest of my team spent last week doing chainsaw training, and I didn't feel capable of participating due to muscle strain.

Instead of firefighting, I have spent the last week and a half learning what's involved in submitting a WCB claim (and I just found out mine was approved).  I've also been taking advantage of the time off to visit friends in Vancouver and family and goats and so on on the island.

The back is slowly healing.. I no longer need to brace myself too much for such activities as lying down/standing up/standing on my right leg/sneezing/etc.  I am starting to incorporate some strength-building exercises into my stretching/physio routine.  I hope to go back to work within a couple of weeks now.  The tough part is that I will have to pass the WFX-Fit test that I did to get into bootcamp to prove that I am fit for work again.  It will be interesting to see how it goes the second time around (it was pretty tough on the first go and I was only 20 seconds short of the 14min30sec cutoff time).

I hear that there has been a little bit of activity up at the base - last I spoke to my team, one of the crews was out looking for a reported smoke resulting from a lightning strike.  Hopefully I will be back in business by the time fire activity starts in earnest.

Things have been quiet on the blog front, but not so on the job front!

Last Friday we did helicopter hover exit and entry training.  There were some surprises for me:

1. When you're hover exiting a helicopter, you don't jump.



The key to a good hover exit or entry is a smooth and steady transfer of weight as close as possible to the helicopter's centre of gravity, as the pilot has to compensate for your movements at all times in order to keep the helicopter flying.  So when you're exiting, yes you have to move yourself out the door and lower yourself down until you're hanging by your arms.  But then you just hold on and let the pilot carefully lower the machine until your feet touch the ground.  At that point you smoothly and gently let go then duck yourself down just off to the side of the helicopter within the rotor disk while the rest of your team exits, one by one.  Once everyone is out (which for a well-trained 3-person crew should happen in 1-2 minutes), the helicopter will lift off and go back to your pre-arranged full landing site where it can pick up your gear on a long line and drop it in to your location.


2. You generally don't pass gear out of the helicopter when you hover exit.

Yes, you might bring a small pack or a chainsaw (to clear a better landing pad), and the first person out always carries a radio in case the helicopter has to abort and lift off suddenly.  But other than that gear is dealt with separately to the hover exiting process.  The goal is to minimize the time the helicopter is hovering, as it is a risky manoever.  Hovering means the pilot would not be able to use autorotation to his or her advantage should the engine fail and so such a problem would probably result in a bad crash.


3. When hover entering, the helicopter gets so low to the ground that you can put your knee onto the skid.


Again it's all about a smooth weight transition, and that's a lot easier if you put a knee up on the skid and slowly shift your weight from your standing leg onto the knee on the 'copter.  It's actually probably a little easier than doing a hover exit.  But it's a lot more rare since generally-speaking, there is less urgency to leaving a fire, you're already on the ground so normally you can clear or build a proper landing pad, and there tend to be more options to hike out to a better pickup point.

I will add another post with a video of ME hover exiting/entering once I get a copy of it but meanwhile here are a couple that I took of my fellow firefighters.

Official Wildfire Fighter Uniform

The last couple of days I have worn my reds and blues.  We don't normally wear them around base since they're made of fancy fire-retardant material and we don't want to wear them out, but this is the outfit I wear whenever I'm called out to a fire or doing other special training activities.

That doesn't mean I've been to fires in the last couple of days... a real fire for me is yet to come.

But Wednesday after work we met the local volunteer fire department up at the airport for a training exercise.  It involved setting up portable water tanks for the fire trucks to fill and from which we pumped foam onto on imaginary fire in the blackberry bushes along the side of the runway.  My job was to get the pump running and man the artificial water source, and all went well.  Meanwhile the fire department guys helped with spraying the bushes, transporting the water, and setting up sprinklers to "protect" a building from the "impending flames".  It was fun!

Yesterday we did our own fairly similar training exercise at our base along with our CFFs (contract fire fighters who are called in as needed).  I ended that exercise soaking wet because the hose filling our portable tank from the municipal water main at some point started gushing out like a fountain, drowning the pump.  I had to try to wrestle it back into the tank and find a way to make it stay put while I got the pump going again... which I did not all that successfully hence the wetness.  Luckily it was a sunny day  and again I had a lot of fun.

As of an hour and a half ago, I am on minimum standby for the weekend.  This means that between 8:30am and 10:30pm today and Monday, and between 10am and 10pm Saturday and Sunday, I could get a call telling me I need to be at base and ready to hop in a truck or helicopter (in my reds and blues) within 20 minutes.  It takes me about 13mins to pedal hard from my house up the hill to the base, so I have a little leeway for getting my things together and getting changed once I get there.  I will not be able to stray far or to do any activity that leaves me away from my phone (like say going swimming), as I must be ready to respond.  I think I may be doing a lot of at home yoga classes and arts and crafts this summer..

Lunch/meeting room

The IA Truck

Gear Shed

Freshly mowed

Lunch at the Lake

Base.

Tuesday was another beautiful sunny day in Vancouver, so my good friend Deb (who is also conveniently unemployed at the moment) and I decided to go on a hike.  We followed my new favourite North Shore route up towards Whyte Lake and on to West Knob.  Of course we did a little Swiss Army style trail clearing along the way.

Who needs a chainsaw?

There on the sunny, mossy, piney bluff, looking North towards the Sunshine Coast, I got a phone call.  It was a chap from the Coastal Fire Centre, calling to offer me a job fighting wildfires for the summer from the base in Sechelt.  As it happens, this was my first choice of location.  I will be starting work on Monday.

Jumping in Whyte Lake

I'm rather excited about being based in Sechelt for the summer.  Not only is it quite close to Vancouver (about 50km of biking broken by a 40 minute ferry ride), but it's also a prime summer destination.  There are kayaking trips a-plenty in Sechelt Inlet, hiking in a number of nearby provincial parks, and some great cycling options too.  Furthermore, the helicopter flights that take me to some of my fires will pass over a gorgeous coastline with lots of fjords and inlets and mountains and other pretty things.  I may end up visiting some parts of the province that very few people have access to.

So far I know one person based in the same location.  Sechelt is the home base of one of my instructors from boot camp.  He was a good one: brimming with knowledge about trees and maps and fires.  I'm not sure whether I will be on his Initial Attack team or another one, as I believe there are 2 or 3 that share the same base.

More news to come Monday after I pick up my reds and blues..

This is not me at all, but it will be..

It's time to revive the blog with tales from firefighter training.. and hopefully more tales of firefighting to come throughout the summer.

All smiles on Day 1.. little did I know what I was in for.