IDNR – Division of Forestry, Fire Control
Early Chronology of Indiana
forests and legislation:
1899 -- The
Forest Reservation Law was the first forest legislation in Indiana, however there were no appropriation dollars for
administration.
1905 – The General
Assembly passed the first Indiana Fire Laws
1919 -- The
various Boards, including that of Forestry, were consolidated into the
Department of Conservation.
1927 --
Power was given to the Division to detect and suppress fires on private land,
using money from the Forestry fund.
1929 -- The
Clark-McNeary Fire Law was approved by the State Legislature and brought in
Federal funds that could be used for fire suppression.
1931 –
Legislature authorized state funding for fire fighting.
1933 –
Established the Emergency Conservation Work program and the Civilian
Conservation Corp (CCC).
1934 – First
coordinated fire prevention programs began.
1935 – Fire
Wardens were appointed and the first Fire School was held.
1936 – New
fire organization within Division of Forestry formed.
1942 –
Forest Fire Fighters Service (FFFS) was organized in Indiana.
1943 –
Indiana Defense Council helped organize and train volunteer Civilian Defense
Forest Fire Fighters during World War II.
1947 –
Forestry Fund amended to include fire funding.
1954 –
Division is able to procure fire equipment through the Federal Excess Property
Program.
1964 –
Georgia Fire
1964 – First
Fire Coordinator appointed for the Indiana Division of Forestry.
1965 – The
Indiana Department of Conservation became the Indiana Department of Natural
Resources.
1976 –
Dispatched the first out-of-state crew to assist with national fire fighting
efforts.
1994 –
Celebrated the 50th Anniversary of Smokey Bear and Fire Prevention
Historical Record of Fire in Indiana
Man has burned Indiana’s forests for centuries. Native Americans used much
of Indiana as hunting grounds and set fire to drive game or
improve forage habitat for game. Studies from tree rings in the southern part
of the state indicate fire was used on a 5-7 year cycle in much of our forests.
When
European settlers came into the region they were more interested in clearing
land for farming than in using the trees that forested our state. Some trees
were sawed and used for homes and farm buildings, but the vast majority of the
trees were cleared and burned. Reportedly, neighboring farmers got together and
had timber burning bees.
There
was also a tradition of burning brought to the New World by the Scotch and Irish settlers. In their homeland these people had
regularly burned the heath to improve forage quality for their livestock. The
Scotch and Irish believed that by burning the forests, they would increase the
amount of forage for their livestock and kill fever germs and varmints. Over
time a culture of spring burning was passed down to generations without basis
or an understanding of the impact of fire.
Cornell
Kemper, a Fire Warden in Dubois County, remarked that up through the 1950’s, certain areas
were known for a culture that encouraged burning the woods. He noted that
well-meaning locals who believed they were keeping down the number of ticks and
snakes continually burned southeastern Martin and northeastern Orange County’s woods, an area he referred to as Lagenour Ridge.
Kemper remembers the locals being friendly to fire suppression crews, but never
offering to help.
Violet
Harrell, wife of a Lawrence County fire warden recalls many fires were caused in the
spring when people were burning off their gardens and fields. Arsonists were
also responsible for a large number of fires. One man, she recalls, was finally
arrested when they discovered he had been setting fires when he ran out of
tobacco. He’d wait for the firefighters to show up and then bum tobacco off
them.
By
1938, records showed the primary cause of forest fires in Indiana was the burning of brush piles, fields, fencerows,
and ditch banks. Early “Forest Fires of Indiana” publications provided
educational information on options for burning. The publication had cost
comparisons and results of burning versus plowing or bush hogging in
controlling weeds and insects. Careless smokers were the second major cause of
fire starts. Lightening or other natural causes account for less than one
percent of forest fires in Indiana.
The
years during World War II saw an increase in railroad fires as the supplies
shipped by rail increased and the demand for train resources pushed defective
equipment and inexperienced personnel into service. In 1943 there were 38 fires
attributed to railroads, burning 4,054 acres. The war years also saw a constant
change-over in personnel that made it difficult to keep fire-fighters trained
and organized.
Fire Laws In Indiana
In 1905, when the first fire laws were passed, according
to reports “there was great rejoicing among the heads of the Conservation
Department at that time.” The Secretary
of the Board of Forestry went so far as to say this was the best piece of
forest fire legislation yet passed in all of America, that it could not help
but work, and declared the fire problem was finally solved. Time has proven them wrong, but the fire laws
were indisputably, an important early step in fire control.
Under the 1905 Act it was provided that for setting fire
to any woods belonging to another, or for placing fire on one’s own property
and permitting it to spread to the woods of another, there be a fine of from $5
to $50. Further liability was incurred to the owner or owners for damages
sustained. It also became the duty of the prosecuting attorney to faithfully
investigate and prosecute each case. Failure to do so would be sufficient
evidence for his removal from office and his bondsman would be liable for the
full damage sustained.
Another
section of the Act provided imprisonment for anyone setting fire maliciously.
It also appointed the Township Road Supervisor as responsible for suppressing
forest fires and authorized him to hire labor for this purpose at $1.50/day.
The setup was doomed to fail because, while the road supervisor had the
authority to use his labor and his appropriations on the suppression of forest
fires, the money came out of his regular road budget. No additional funds were
appropriated for this purpose. The road
supervisor was elected to construct and maintain roads, and knowing the
condition of the roads would determine his success or failure, usually did very
little on forest fire suppression.
As
Americans became more aware of the impact and costs of wildfires, the timing
was right, in 1921 for the Clarke-McNeary Act, sponsored by Senators McNeary of
Oregon and Clarke of New York. This Act allotted funds to the Forest Service,
which were in turn passed on to states who had forests to protect and who met
certain technical requirements. The Indiana State Legislature did not comply
with this law until 1929, when personnel at state forests, Brown County Game
Preserve, and Dunes State
Park were
organized bringing the Department in line with requirements to qualify for
federal funding.
After the Indiana Senate defeated the forest fire
bill in 1930 on the grounds that no serious problem confronted Indiana,
State Forester Wilcox took George Freeman of the State General Assembly up for
an aerial tour of southern Indiana.
They spotted five going fires. As a result of this experience, in 1931, the
2-mill forestry tax was amended by the state legislature to include forest fire
protection on both state and private lands.
The
Forestry Fund was amended in 1947 to include fire funding. The General Assembly
levied a portion of property taxes to be used for the prevention, detection,
control and suppression of forest fires, as well as other forest-related
endeavors. This Act outlined the responsibilities of the Division of Forestry
in fire fighting and granted wildland firefighters the same rights of access as
municipal firemen. It also provided that fire fighters could “set back fires,
dig trenches, cut lanes, and use all other modern methods of fire fighting on
private lands.”
The Act
further directed the Indiana Department of Conservation to work with volunteer
fire fighters, establishing the Indiana Volunteer Forest Fire Fighters Service.
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The State Fire Warden is
shown here providing evidence to support the prosecution in a fire trespass
case brought by the US Forest Service in County Court.
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The number of State Districts varied over time, in
1943, this map shows the three districts operating at that time. The northern
district focused on protection from grazing. The southern district’s focus
was on fire protection. Regardless of how many districts the area was divided
into, the general boundaries of the fire protection area have remained the
same. By 1952 Indiana was
organized into 9 districts and in 2001,there 18 forest districts.
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Fire Program and Organization
Historically, the forest fire program has been divided
into three activities: prevention, detection, and suppression.
Prevention consists of education on using care with fire, safe
burning techniques, removal of fire hazards, and the development of barriers
such as firebreaks and roads.
Detection has included a system of fire towers or lookouts
connected to a centrally located headquarters, fire wardens, aerial
surveillance, and cooperative relationships with local fire departments and
landowners.
Suppression consists of the actual effort to combat fire, as well
as the training and equipping of the suppression organization.
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In 1937 Indiana
participated in a national campaign kicked off by President Roosevelt. With
approximately forty million acres lost to fire each year across the nation,
this campaign featured Uncle Sam as a forest ranger. The message spoke to the
human element of fire, emphasizing people’s responsibility in protecting the
forest. The message- “Your Forests – Your Fault – Your Loss” was a powerful
message for the public.
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The fire
suppression forces organized in 1929 began to slowly grow when, in 1933, the
Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) Camps were established in the forested areas
of the state. The CCC boys, under the
supervision of foresters, immediately assumed fire suppression
responsibilities, and the volunteer organizations languished or played only a
minor role. The availability of the CCC
as fire fighters led to a growing carelessness on the part of people who
thought if their fire did get out of control, the CCC boys would put it
out. In fact, several camps were little
more than fire departments in the dry season.
Time, which could have been spent by the CCC in useful construction and
maintenance projects, was instead spent suppressing countless wildfires.
In
1936 a new organization was established to focus on forest fires in Indiana. Two trained foresters were hired to devote their
entire time to prevention, detection, and suppression of forest fires. The two
men worked with the U.S. Forest Service to develop a cooperative budget to
erect fire towers and telephone lines and fund educational work connected with
forest fire protection. More on fire towers, fire wardens and the early fire
organizations is included later in this chapter.
The
fire season in 1938 was one of the most destructive in memory with 27,000 acres
reported burned in the first two weeks of November. As a result, in 1939, to
better address the fire suppression needs, the state expanded its fire force to
60 temporary wardens and 600 temporary fire guards.
In
order to provide better information on fire danger, in 1939 six fire weather
stations were established at strategic points including Morgan-Monroe and Clark State Forests. Today IDNR maintains one weather station at Harrison Crawford State Forest. In addition, information from two U.S. Forest
Service fire weather stations, one south of Lake Monroe and one at St. Croix, is
available to the State.
By
1939, Indiana had agreements in place with the Soil Conservation
Service, the U.S. Park Service, and the U.S. Forest Service for the purpose of
coordinating fire control work throughout the state. These agreements have
changed over time, but wild fire protection in the state is still shared with
the U.S. Forest Service.
During the period from July 1, 1940 to June
30, 1941, Indiana
burned 80,159 acres, the highest annual acreage since organized fire protection
had begun. State Forester Paul Yost brought on two District Foresters at the
central office to head up the property, fire, and forest classification
programs. He hoped that by strengthening his state forces he could better cope
with future severe fire years.
During
the War Years, with the closing of the CCC camps and the expansion of war
industries, it became difficult to find manpower of any kind. To combat the
shortage of manpower, many women were employed as observers on state fire
towers.
The
Indiana Defense Council was called on to help organize and train civilian
defense volunteer forest fire fighters to hold the line. During this same
period, the areas surrounding the U.S. Naval Ammunition Depot in Martin County, the Jefferson Proving Ground near Madison, and Camp Atterbury near Columbus, were given increased fire protection under
provisions of the Sixth Supplemental National Defense Act and the Clarke-McNary
Special Emergency Act that provided 50 percent of the funds for protecting
these critical areas. Fire personnel were employed on these projects throughout
the hazardous periods of the year.
Joseph
S. DeYoung was employed during this period to organize and supervise the
statewide program of Civilian Defense Forest Fire Fighters. The program trained
thousands of high school students and adults for emergency use in fire
fighting.
In 1959, part of the State’s fire fighting organization
was transferred from the Division of Forestry to the Division of Enforcement
within the Indiana Department of Conservation. The transfer involved a shake-up
that made headlines as five district and 20 county fire wardens lost their
jobs. Ralph Wilcox, State Forester, defended eliminating the positions when
$85,000 was cut from his budget. The State’s position was that enforcement
officers could do fire-fighting work more efficiently. Stationing laborers at
fire towers during peak fire seasons was expected to result in further savings.
Once the Division of Enforcement took control of
the fire program, fire protection coverage was expanded from 22 counties to 48
counties. John D. Rawlins, Director of the Enforcement Division of 116
conservation officers, pledged to step up fire protection and educational work
in all 92 counties.
Indiana Department of Conservation, Division of
Forestry established a new position of Fire Coordinator in July 1964. This
position was established to work directly with the Law Enforcement Division and
other related agencies to take the lead in the state’s fire control program.
G.T. (Bill) Donceel was the first person to fill this position. His duties also
included training personnel in fire prevention, detection, suppression, and
communications. The position was located at Fire Control Headquarters in the Morgan-Monroe
State Forest.
Initially the staff at Fire Headquarters included a
“Quartermaster” officer who managed the equipment program and served in a dual
capacity in law enforcement; an assistant who inspected fire towers, an
equipment operator, a mechanic, and a communications specialist.
In
2001, Fire Headquarters staff includes the State Fire Coordinator, two
assistant positions, a fire prevention coordinator, a program coordinator, two
heavy equipment operators and two mechanics. The staff is responsible for not
only the fire program, but also manages vehicles and equipment for the Division
of Forestry.
The warehouse at Fire Headquarters is shown here in
1964 with a line up of new trucks to be outfitted for fire.
Indiana has always had adequate manpower and equipment for
normal fire seasons. It was only in severe seasons, such as 1964, that the
resources were stretched too thin to meet the needs. In 1965, G.T. Donceel made
the case that Indiana lost one-third more acres per fire than other central
states because of a shortage of men and equipment. The emphasis obviously
needed to shift to equipping and training more volunteer units and establishing
units in counties that were outside protection districts. Donceel’s appeal
included that Indiana had historically been funded at a lower level than
adjacent states. In example, in 1963, Indiana’s fire protection expenditures were $0.043/acre; Illinois spent $0.069/acre, Ohio spent $0.114/acre and Michigan spent $0.142/acre. REST OF
THE STORY?
The
Division of Forestry has wildland fire responsibility for 7.328 million acres
in the state. The role the division has played in wildland fire has markedly
changed over time. As rural fire departments play a stronger role, the
department’s focus has shifted to supporting these rural and volunteer fire
departments. Today, roughly 95 percent of all wildland fires in Indiana are suppressed by these fire departments.
The position of Indiana Fire Coordinator has been held
by:
G.T. (Bill) Donceel, 1964-1968
Les Shannon, 1967-1968
Bill Willsey, 1969- 1978
Steve Creech, 1978-Present
Lookout Towers
Ralph
F. Wilcox who became State Forester in 1929, had come to Indiana from Pennsylvania and was well aware of the ravages of wild fire. He
immediately began to lay plans for the construction of fire towers and better
methods of organizing fire crews. At the time, Indiana had only one fire tower, located at Clark State Forest. The tower bore a sign proclaiming “Stay off. Unsafe
to climb.”
One
of the first challenges was determining where the high points were to build the
towers. In the mid 1930’s, Indiana
was one of few states that had not been completely mapped topographically.
Without elevation maps, the job of locating towers on the most efficient high
points was a hit or miss proposition.
After 20 fire towers were erected, a complete visibility survey, with
the use of special precision instruments, found that three towers had to be
dismantled and moved, the remainder needed to be extended twenty feet in
height, and eleven additional towers were needed.
By 1952 there were 32 towers in the state. A map and
listing of their location follows:
IDNR Towers
COUNTY NAME OF TOWER Location Of Nearest Town/State
Property
Brown Lily
Fire Tower Bear Wallow
(near Nashville)
Brown Weed Patch Tower Brown County State
Park
Clark Henryville Tower Clark State Forest
Clark Borden Tower Borden,
IN
Crawford Spears Tower Taswell, IN
Dubois Ferdinand Ferdinand State Forest
Floyd Hickman Hill Tower Lanesville, IN
Greene Cincinnati Tower Cincinnati, IN
Harrison Wyandotte Tower Harrison State Forest
Jackson Skyline Tower Jackson State Forest
Jefferson Five Points Tower Lancaster, IN
Jennings Muscatatuck Tower Muscatatuck State
Park
Lawrence Georgia Tower Mitchell, IN
Martin Lacy
Tower Lacy, IN (near
Shoals)
Martin Willow Valley Tower Martin State Forest
Monroe Mason Ridge Morgan-Monroe State Forest
Morgan Wilbur Tower Martinsville, IN
Orange Orange
Fire Tower Paoli,
IN
Owen McCormick Tower McCormicks Creek State
Park
Owen Cataract Tower Cloverdale, IN
Pike Hartwell Tower Pike State Forest
Pulaski Jasper-Pulaski Tower Jasper-Pulaski
Game Reserve
Pulaski Winamac Tower Tippecanoe River State
Park
Ripley Versailles Tower Versailles, IN
Spencer Lincoln City Tower Lincoln State
Park
Sullivan Pleasantville Tower Greene-Sullivan State Forest
Washington Salem Tower Salem,
IN
The U.S. Naval Ammunition Depot at Burns City in Martin County operated three towers during World War II.
U.S. Forest Service Towers
BROWNSTOWN DISTRICT
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LAFAYETTE DISTRICT (now Tell City)
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Jackson Houston Tower
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Perry - Marchand Tower, Buzzard Roost Tower, Spears Tower, and West Fork Tower
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Monroe Dutch Ridge Tower
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Monroe Hickory Ridge Tower
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If the fire tower was located on state
property, the property furnished the towerman. Other towers were manned by
local personnel who were paid as needed. G.T. Donceel remembers the system as
mostly working well, “if they were needed, and the fire danger was high, they
were always up in their towers.” However Donceel notes some towermen were in
the towers when it rained just to put in more hours.
Not all the fire towers were manned by
men, at least two women are known to have served as regular lookouts in Indiana
towers. In addition, during World War II, with so many men serving in the
military, many women filled in as tower lookouts.
Clarisse Carroll, towerwoman for the Georgia
Tower explained how her tower was
constructed and what the lookout’s job was from 1950-1970:
“Fire towers were constructed of four
angle ironbars, set in deep concrete about twenty feet apart, four square and
ending a hundred feet in the air. There is a seven by seven foot cab
constructed of a wooden floor, sheet metal and glass sides and a metal roof.
One side of the floor is a door which the towerman lifts on his shoulders to
enter and which he lets down on his back as he leaves. Inside the cab is a cabinet, directly in the
center of the room on which rests an alidade, (an instrument also called an
Osborne Fire Finder consisting of a map mounted on a round rule marked off in
degrees) used in mapping. The cabinet
has a door and has room to store the psychrometer and weather book by which the
towerman determines the fire danger.
The psychrometer, an instrument with a
wet and dry bulb thermometer, is used for measuring the amount of moisture in
the air. Three times a day, the
`towerman' would leave the tower, go to the ground and twirl the psychrometer
to pick up the air moisture and then mount the tower again and record the
readings. One of the thermometers had a cloth fastened to the mercury end to
catch the moisture in the air. It was necessary to go to the ground to take the
weather reading as the air differs at a hundred feet high and fires start on
the ground!
The furniture in the cab consisted of one
tall chair, a small electric space heater, kerosene heaters were used in the
early days, a broom, a telephone which must be kept sitting on the floor so the
wind wouldn’t knock it off and a C.B. radio sitting on a small iron box in
which it can be locked up at night. C.B. radios were issued in 1951. Phones
were party lines and when one number was called, all the phones on the line
rang. Some people were habitual evesdroppers, which could be an advantage. If
someone called up and excitedly reported a fire, and the towerman wasn’t able
to get the details, someone else listening on the line, was always sure to have
heard.
Since communication was so important, and
early phone lines were strung haphazardly. After a storm the towerman was to
walk the telephone line, carrying an axe to get the limbs off the line, or prop
it up; cut away the briars, and patch it up. It was great relief when we got
new telephone lines strung to the tower.”
She further explains one gets into the
cab by climbing sixteen steps to the first landing, turn right, fifteen steps
to the next, turn right, twelve steps to the next and so on until one has
climbed one hundred and twenty three steps.
It was also necessary to carry a container of water, lunch and the
weather equipment.
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Unknown
Indiana towerman with the tools
of his trade in the cab of his firetower. The Osborne Fire Finder, lower
right, was a map with a siting mechanism which was used to determine the
azmuth to a smoke. The fire’s location could be pinned down when triangulated
with other towers.
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Fire
Wardens Appointed
In August, 1935, the state commissioner’s approved
Clarke-McNeary Budget included an item for paid suppression. This created the
Office of Forest Fire Warden. The three
district foresters were given power to appoint an initial 65 fire wardens. Their qualifications were that they must be
“of high type, well-thought-of citizens, interested in Conservation, and have a
car and a telephone.” Each of these men was to organize and supervise a crew of
ten fire guards.
The
forest fire wardens were initially paid twenty-five cents an hour and five
cents mileage for the use of their cars. Their crew of fire guards were paid
fifteen cents an hour while fighting fire.
Even in those days, these were paltry wages and anyone who applied was
more interested in conservation than the money the job offered. The pay merely helped compensate them and
make them feel their time and effort was appreciated. There was some concern that
if the pay was increased, it might become profitable for people to set fire
intentionally in order to fight them. By the late 1940’s, the State had assumed
liability for injury to anyone fighting fire.
The most important job the fire warden had, other
than the actual extinguishing of the fire, was completing a fire report for
each fire in his area. Indiana’s
fire reports were identical to those used by the United States Forest Service.
In 1936, as a result of the fire reports completed, the state had its first
complete figures on causes of fires, number of fires, and acres burned.
These figures were used in a 10-day educational
program held the next year for all fire wardens and towermen. When coupled with
the evolving fire permit laws, the fire wardens were then expected to help
educate their neighbors and anyone indicating they intended to burn. If a
farmer was going to burn a field, the wardens could explain how he should plow
a safety strip along the edge and back fire from the strip.
As
the wardens organized their fire crews across the state, each crew was equipped
with ten fire rakes, one axe, one first aid kit, one crosscut saw, one five or
seven gallon Indian back pack pump, one five gallon Indian supply tank, and in
some cases, four or five beaters where grass fires are prevalent.
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Both the Indiana Department
of Conservation and the US Forest Service employed fire wardens. Here a
supervisor is inspecting one of the U.S. Forest Service fire warden’s caches
of tools – traditionally kept in bright red buildings next to the county road.
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The State
also immediately set up training for their newly appointed wardens. The first
2-day fire school was held at the headquarters of the southeastern district in
October 1935. One day was devoted
entirely to the methods of making reports, expense vouchers, payrolls, and the
proper procedure of law enforcement. The
second day was devoted to methods of suppressing fires by the use of blackboard
illustrations and finally, the fighting of a mock fire in the field with
constructive criticisms given by the district foresters. The school was such a success that it was
held annually for several years, usually at Spring
Mill State Park.
By the
following year, a Forest Fire Manual was printed and distributed to the fire
wardens. This manual contained various
information including diagrams on fighting fire under different circumstances,
fire statistics, and information on fire tools, including how to make tools
from scraps:
In 1959, the Division spent 8,654 hours in
educating their fire fighters and the public. Training was conducted for 2,400
boys in the FFFS. Cornell Kemper, Fire Warden for Dubois County from 1947-1953,
remembers high school boys who fought fire were not paid, they were just happy
to get out of school. He said they got little help from organized fire
departments since at that time these were generally in cities and towns and
their firemen were not trained to fight forest fires.
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Here boys are being shown
how to use a Kortick Tool (now called a McCloud) to clear line, and a
“swatter” to smother fires burning in grass.
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Forest Protection Associations
As the Departments’ educational work built
momentum, fire programs became a popular draw for local groups, especially in
the southern part of the state. The programs advertised “moving pictures” and
were well illustrated with pictures of fire damage and fish and game
conservation projects.
Resident landowners in many areas of the state
organized local forest protective associations. The first such protective
association was organized in Brown County
in 1930. Resident landowners volunteered
their services in fighting forest fires on all land within the organization’s
area. Non-resident landowners also participated by paying a fee to the
organization of $1/year for protection of 100 acres or less and one cent/year
for every acre in excess of the first 100 acres. The monies were used to buy fire rakes, brush
hooks and axes, and other fire tools that were then cached for use only in fire
fighting. Many of the associations were centered on the local fire tower. In Jackson
County, the association actually
collected monies to purchase a tower site and construct a fire tower.
An example of the cooperation and interest in the
southern part of the state is shown in an effort in 1930. The extension
forester for Brown County
wrote three letters about forest fires. The county agent supplied the names and
addresses of all the farmers in the county. The State Forester’s office
mimeographed the letters and mailed them. As a result of this cooperative
effort, in the spring of 1931, there were no forest fires in the Brown
County area.
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It was not only adults who became
interested in fire prevention, children also organized to help prevent wild
fires. In Jennings County,
1,658 children enrolled in Junior Guardian of the Forest Clubs, pledging to
study forestry and prevent forest fires. Many of the children participated in
a conservation essay contest. The Civilian Conservation Corp Camp at North
Vernon sponsored the Junior Guardians.
The three brothers shown here, Gene,
Richard, and Donald Eden were in a Forest Guardians Club. When a fire spread
onto their farm in Jennings County
from an adjacent farm they notified the CCC camp, and helped fight the fire
to bring it under control.
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The broom rake was the
most common fire tool. The rake quickly clears a path of leaves and is an
efficient tool in areas where there is little brush and the primary material
burning is leaves.
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The
shovel and axe are used in traditional ways. The axe is used to cut limbs and
clear logs and other debris in the way of fire line construction. The shovel
is used to dig out burning roots, logs, and to bury smoldering fires.
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Backpack
pumps held 5 gallons of water and use an adjustable pump nozzle to spray a
stream of water fairly high into trees to put out smoldering snags.
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This drip torch, filled
with a mixture of diesel and gasoline allows fire fighters to drip a line of
fire for backfiring along an established control line.
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This
tool is a Pulaski, named for a well-known Forest Ranger who heroically saved
his crew in a wildfire. The tool combines an axe with a sharpened hoe and has
many uses in fire line construction.
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Called a flapper, a
swatter or a beater, this tool’s long handle allows firefighters to stand
well back from hot grass fires while literally swatting out the flames with
the thick rubber flap. Where groundcover is short, the flapper can be dragged
along the fire edge to smother the fire.
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Council
Tools are sharp toothed and cut through sod and small roots to clear a fire
line.
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This McLeod tool is not as
common in Indiana but can be used as a rake
or as a hoe.
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Despite advances in technology, hand tools used in fire fighting have
changed little over the years. IDNR still equips fire fighters with tools
almost identical to those issued to fire fighters a century ago. Today IDNR
supplies cooperating fire departments with a cache of wildfire handtools worth
approximately $800 including 6 council rakes, 2 collapsible broom rakes, 4 fire
swatters, 2 fire shovels, and 2 backpack pumps.
By the late 1930’s, Indiana realized that efficient fire suppression necessitates
the use of special heavy equipment. Indiana foresters were convinced that the high dollar value
of their forests, and its value as wildlife habitat, could easily justify the
cost of adding heavy equipment to their fire suppression organization. However,
the money to fund heavy equipment was somewhat slow in coming. The first such
equipment purchased was a tilt-bed 2.5 ton truck with a crawler tractor in the
late 1960’s.
Today the Fire Headquarters staff is responsible for the
maintenance of the entire Division of Forestry’s fleet of vehicles. Some heavy
equipment also is staged at the site with operators and is available to assist
with heavy equipment work on state properties. The staff also administers
chainsaw training and maintains some other equipment such as saws.
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The first out of state assignment for Indiana resources was in September 1976 when a 20-person
crew was sent to Minnesota. Since that time Indiana has sent crews, single resource overhead, engines,
dispatchers, prevention specialists, and technical experts to support all of
the states shown here in red.
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Though
IDNR, the Hoosier National
Forest, and
the National Park Service have always worked cooperatively on fire issues, as
the role of the Incident Command System has increased, this partnership has
strengthened. The Incident Command System, patterned after the fire
organization used on large wildland fires, is now used on other large incidents
such as floods, tornadoes, and earthquakes. It was also used to support New York City after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attack. Hoosiers have been dispatched to
support incidents from fire to floods, ice storms, hurricanes, tornadoes, and
terrorist attacks.
