r/Wildfire • u/WoodSharpening • 2d ago

dollar for dollar

I'm sure this is a complicated calculation, but for the hell of it, what do you figure is most effective, dollar for dollar, water bombers or hand crews?

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u/tzmjones 1d ago

Ask your fire planner. There are a number of factors that are assessed in the suppression response aspect of fire planning - response time, type of resource, production rates at specific response levels, availability of contingency resources, costs per production unit (like per unit of line built per hour), etc.

All that being said, is the retardant tanker or aerial resource being used effectively? By retardant use definitions that means retardant is reaching the ground in a rain-like form followed up by ground-based resources. Some of the videos I have been seeing are very low drops (quite spectacular), not necessarily followed up by folks on the ground. There are also drops on high-intensity fire so hot that it doesn't allow for retardant to do its thing, drops in high winds, and painting areas red as "the only option available" because (politically) you can't stand back and do nothing.

So, is an aerial suppression response more cost-effective than a ground-based response? The question is way more complicated than that.