Busiest year for aerial firefighters at Pocatello Regional Airport

POCATELLO – It’s supposed to be the tail end of fire season.

But between the Roosevelt, Marten Creek, and Eight Mile fires and others, this record-breaking year doesn’t seem to be slowing down anytime soon.

And in Pocatello, that means more air traffic.

“You’ll see those aircraft coming and going several times a day, every hour they’ll pick up retardant, they’ll go drop and then they’ll come back and pick up more then go drop,” said Pocatello Regional Airport management assistant Kristy Heinz.

Pocatello Regional Airport has been home base for the region’s BLM aerial firefighters since the late eighties following the Johnny Creek fire in 1987.

Right now, it’s housing a double-digit number of planes that drop retardant on regional fires every day. They leave at sunrise, and return at sunset. And the increased air traffic hasn’t gone unnoticed by the Pocatello community.

“They use some really large aircraft sometimes to fight the fires and those do make a lot of noise. They also look a lot closer because they are a lot larger than the normal commercial aircraft that we have flying out,” said Heinz.

And if you’re thinking the amount of air traffic is higher than past years, you’re right.

BLM’s record high for retardant used in one fire season is 1.5 million gallons, they’ve used 2.8 million so far this season.

When the DC-10 tanker arrived in Pocatello a few years ago, they were told there would never be more than one present at a time.

For much of this season, there have been three.

“Their activity is really based on what fires are going on and if there’s an active fire, they could sit here and not be going anywhere,” said Heinz.

But this season, that’s rarely been the case.

This article was first published by KPVI. It is used here with permission.