Firefighters from the city are headed to the woods this weekend to learn wildland firefighting skills so they can help out if and when wildfire season really kicks in.
One hundred twenty-five firefighters from 25 agencies around western Oregon are taking part in the 12th annual Metro Advanced Wildland School.
It trains structural firefighters in wildland firefighting techniques and gets them certified to hit the fire lines around Oregon and neighboring states.
"We used to be deployed on four-day and seven-day conflagrations before. Now, they’re 14 and 28 days. The Bootleg Fire being one of the largest we’ve had in the state of Oregon, are unfortunately becoming the norm now rather than the exception," said Rich Saalsaa, Philomath deputy fire chief.
Saalsaa says the students are about 50-50 volunteers and career firefighters.
They'll learn, among other lessons, to use different hand tools, hoses and sprinklers as well as radio communication with a helicopter doing water drops.
For some, talking to a pilot in a copter is almost like learning a different language.
"We’re not typically used to doing that, outside of a medical evac or something like that. So going through the different verbiage is something we have to work through because we come from different backgrounds. So we have to have a common terminology. So that’s what we’re working on today is that common terminology and really clear communication so we can get the job done," said Rachel Brozovich, a Keiser Fire District captain.
The reason clear communication is so important with something like a water drop is that the water coming out of the bucket the copter is carrying falls with a force of eight pounds per gallon, so a 100-gallon bucket of water could hit firefighters with 800 pounds of force, enough to hurt or even kill them.
And that would be one of the smaller buckets. They can go up to 1,000 gallons.
The training is happening on private property loaned out for the event.
Saalsaa says the training will not only help crews on wildland fires but back at home as well.
"We're seeing more of that gray area, where the urban and wildlands are coming together, so even what we think of as wildfires are getting closer to more populated areas," said Saalsaa.
Two years ago the state Legislature approved more funding for this kind of training.