FORT SILL, Okla. Feb. 18, 2016 -- Starting fires and putting them out requires a lot of the same kind of training if you're a wildland firefighter.
More than 240 paid and volunteer firefighters from across the state came to Fort Sill, Feb. 12-14, for the 6th Annual Destry Horton Wildland and Emergency Medical Service School, led by Oklahoma State University's Fire Service Training with assistance from Lawton Fire Department.
In addition to classroom training, the firefighters got down and dirty with the flames on Fort Sill's East Range Feb. 13. Taking the wind and humidity into account, the hands-on burn was still a "go" and firefighters began tracing a line around a perimeter with drip torches of flaming fuel. The dry grass took a moment to get going, and then a huge wall of flames danced and crackled, with clumps of grass igniting like giant sparklers.
As each section of waist-high grass burned, firefighters on foot trained hoses on the flames, or drove next to them with trucks which sprayed water from the engine hood and sides. Jared Williams, training chief for the Lawton Fire Department, said the burns train firefighters and helps Fort Sill by reducing the wildfire threat.
Burning an area on purpose is called a prescribed fire, often set to mimic natural conditions that maintain a certain type of grassland or forest, such as on the Wichita Mountains Wildlife Refuge.
Fort Sill's fire department responded to about 230 wildfires last year, most of them started by ammunition being shot into the impact area, said Shawn Sullivan, Fort Sill's deputy fire chief. "The majority of them kept to the impact area and burned themselves out."
The largest was a 7,500 acre wildfire at the Crater Creek Demolition Area on West Range. That was caused during mass casualty training when a vehicle exploded, accidentally setting the woods on fire. "We were out there four to five days fighting fire and maintaining fire breaks," said Sullivan.
That fire required mutual aid from Lawton, the refuge and several other counties. Although Fort Sill's Fire Department is available to help with wildland fires off-post, it was not needed last year. Sullivan said this year is shaping up to be a fairly quiet one so far. "We've had a lot of rain, which helps us out tremendously. Plus we have an aggressive prescribed burn plan, so when these units do their training they're doing it from an area we've already burned."
Instructors for 15 different classes came from OSU, the refuge and Fort Sill. Classroom training, held at Snow Hall, included backfiring operations, engine company tactics, arson investigation and wildland fire origin recognition, foam application and prescribed fires.
The training is done in memory of John Destry Horton who was severely burned fighting a wildfire near Duncan, Okla., on March 1, 2006, and died three weeks later.
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