Oklahoma Forestry Services Use Aircrafts To Fight Wildfires

Sometimes, putting out a wildfire requires aerial assistance, the Oklahoma Forestry Service said on Friday. 

Several factors play into the decision to send a plane out to a wildfire. 

“Aircraft are spread out. We don’t keep them in one place. We place them around the state or at different air tanker bases. So that way, we've got aircraft situated in different locations to minimize that time of response,” said Mark Goeller, Director of OFS. 

Limitations that can prevent an aircraft from being sent out include weather, terrain, time of day, and distance. 

“The opportunity to run into some aerial hazard is high and the consequences are very high. So, if there’s smoke or something obscuring the fire, we won’t send it,” Goeller explained. 

Not all aircraft fight fires equally, the department explained. 

“Aircraft can deliver different types of material to help fight a wildfire," said Goeller. "There's retardant. It's typically the red stuff that you see coming out of the bottom of a plane and sometimes out of a helicopter will set. Then, white is typically either water or foam.” 

Oklahoma Forestry Services said deploying aircraft is extremely expensive. 

“If we're looking at the potential of loss of life or the loss of property, homes, values at risk; we're not going to let that cost stand in the way of helping when we have a bad situation,” Goeller added. 

Oklahoma Forestry Services said they ask civilian aircraft and drone operators to avoid wildfires so firefighting aircraft can navigate safely through areas affected.