Forest Service Technology & Development Program

Forest Service Technology & Development Program Date: 8/12/2013 Project Proposal Submitted by: Tim Lynch Unit: Missoula Technology & Development Center Project Name/Title: Address: 5785 Hwy 10 W Reducing Wildland Fire Entrapments and Missoula, MT 59808 Fire Shelter Deployments by Improving Firefighters’ Threat Recognition Skills Phone: 406-329-3958 E-mail: [email protected]

OVERALL PROBLEM/OBJECTIVE STATEMENT (Describe the problem, how the work is currently being done, and why improvement is needed): Even though wildland firefighters are provided with fire behavior training, weather forecasts, belt weather kits, written guides, checklists, communications systems, lookouts, and other aids, firefighters are still entrapped by fire and burned over on a regular basis. Attempts in recent years to prevent fire entrapments through more rigid adherence to the Fire Orders and Watchouts, use of checklists, implementation of the Incident Response Pocket Guide, threats of administrative or criminal punishment, and other initiatives have failed to eliminate incidences of entrapments and fire shelter deployments. It has long been recognized that nearly all entrapments or fire shelter deployments have a common denominator; a key person or persons underestimated the potential for increased or extreme fire behavior that eventually lead to an entrapment. In many cases, shelter deployment investigations reveal that someone on the fire was concerned about a potential increase in fire behavior, but did not communicate that concern to other persons who might benefit from such knowledge. There are two parts to this second type of failure; one, that an increase in fire behavior was correctly identified as a legitimate concern; and two, that the person (or persons) who recognized the potential for increased fire behavior did not share that information with those who might benefit from it. Whether such a concern is shared with others is almost certainly dependent on the observer’s level of confidence that an increase in fire behavior is likely to happen, but a failure to communicate a perceived threat may also be influenced by cultural customs (organization’s culture discourages challenging someone more experienced or superior in rank who has expressed a different view) or personal barriers (fear of being proven wrong before one’s peers, non-assertive personality, etc). Another barrier to communicating fire behavior threats is the often mistaken assumption that others are already aware of the threat, so there is no need to tell them about it. An individual whose observations lead them to believe that an increase in fire behavior is imminent will probably feel confident enough to overcome cultural and personal barriers to voice their concerns to other firefighters, especially if those firefighters (or civilians) are in a vulnerable location. Therefore, a portion of corrective measures should be directed toward improving the ability of firefighters to predict

Center Manager Center Manager San Dimas Technology & Development Center Missoula Technology & Development Center 444 East Bonita Ave. 5785 Hwy. 10 West San Dimas, CA 91773-3198 Missoula, MT 59808-9361 Phone: 909-599-1267 0371-2M05-MTDC Phone: 406-329-3900 Fax: 909-592-2309 (Rev. 6/04) Fax: 406-329-3719 when and where increased fire behavior is likely to occur, which should raise firefighters’ confidence in their own prediction skills, which should increase the number of firefighters who are willing to share fire behavior-related concerns with other firefighters. Some might question whether additional training measures are needed given since firefighters already receive fire behavior training through the NWCG “S” and “RX” curriculums. Excluding specific hard- to-predict phenomena like firewhirls, the variables in fuel, weather, and topography that drive wildland fire behavior have been intensively studied by scientists and are fairly well understood. Classroom fire behavior training such as S-390 teaches firefighters how to estimate rates of spread and flame lengths by using nomograms, electronic calculators, and paper exercises. However, the most experienced and accurate predictors of fire behavior on wildland fires, such as the operations section chiefs, division supervisors, hotshot superintendents and others who make frequent strategic, tactical, and safety decisions, rarely (if ever) use nomograms, calculators, or paper exercises to determine where firefighters can be safely deployed. Though they may have never heard of the concept, these experts rely on Recognition Primed Decision-making (also referred to as Naturalistic Decision- making) to make their most important wildland fire safety decisions. What is Recognition Primed Decision-making? The following four paragraphs describe RPD and how it works. “Gary Klein is a research psychologist famous for his work in pioneering the field of naturalistic decision making. By studying experts such as firefighters in their natural environment, he discovered that laboratory models of decision-making couldn’t describe decision-making under uncertainty. His Recognition Primed Decision-making (RPD) model has influenced changes in the ways the Marines and Army train their officers to make decisions. Recognition Primed Decision-making (RPD) is a model of how people make quick, effective decisions when faced with complex situations. In this model, the decision maker is assumed to generate a possible course of action, compare it to the constraints imposed by the situation, and select the first course of action that is not rejected. This technique has benefits in that it is rapid, but is prone to serious failure in unusual or misidentified circumstances. The RPD model identifies a reasonable reaction as the first one that is immediately considered. RPD combines two ways of developing a decision; the first is recognizing which course of action makes sense, and the second, evaluating the course of action through imagination to see if the actions resulting from that decision make sense. However, the difference of being experienced or inexperienced plays a major factor in the decision-making processes. RPD reveals a critical difference between experts and novices when presented with recurring situations. Experienced people will generally be able to come up with a quicker decision because the situation may match a prototypical situation they have encountered before. Novices, lacking this experience, must cycle through different possibilities, and tend to use the first course of action that they believe will work. The inexperienced also have the tendencies of using trial and error through their imagination.”

Center Manager Center Manager San Dimas Technology & Development Center Missoula Technology & Development Center 444 East Bonita Ave. 5785 Hwy. 10 West San Dimas, CA 91773-3198 Missoula, MT 59808-9361 Phone: 909-599-1267 0371-2M05-MTDC Phone: 406-329-3900 Fax: 909-592-2309 (Rev. 6/04) Fax: 406-329-3719 In support of the RPD model, the process of learning from prescribed or wildland fire experience has sometimes been likened to assembling slides in a firefighter’s memory slide tray. When it comes to making critical fire management decisions, the kind of learning experience a firefighter/supervisor gets from seeing, hearing and feeling a wide spectrum of fire behavior is frequently more useful than experience gained from reading about fire behavior or listening to someone describe it in a classroom setting or performing a fire behavior calculation. A fire behavior calculation that shows a wind and slope driven grass fire can travel 2,000 feet in less than a minute does not create the same kind of mental “slides” as personally witnessing such an event. Many different combinations of fuel, weather, and topography can lead to extreme fire behavior. Low fuel moisture, low humidity, horizontal fuel continuity, strong wind, high Haines Index, thunderstorms, high temperature, and steep slopes or drainages are common contributors to extreme fire behavior events, but these conditions also are frequently present on fires where no extreme fire behavior is observed. Extreme fire behavior only occurs when a combination of these factors come into alignment for what is usually a relatively short-lived event. Because extreme fire behavior occurs relatively infrequently, even very experienced firefighters are occasionally surprised by extreme fire behavior when it happens in their vicinity. As a result, some of our worst fire behavior prediction failures have happened to our best firefighters. Since nearly all fire behavior related accidents and shelter deployments are preceded by an increase in wind speed and/or change in wind direction, it is apparent that predicting how wind will affect fire behavior and imagining how fast and far a fire can move are difficult challenges for wildland firefighters. Generally, the more fire experience a firefighter has, the more nuanced and accurate will be their assessment of various fire situations. Thus, RPD helps firefighters determine overall fire strategy and tactics because it permits experienced firefighters to visualize (through recollection of similar experiences) the hazards that must be mitigated or avoided, and the probabilities of success of different potential courses of action. If you accept Klein’s theory that RPD is experience-dependent, and that firefighters with a higher level of experience are more likely to detect and avoid dangerous situations, then it follows that the Forest Service should seek to maximize the exposure of all firefighters, and especially those with less experience, to circumstances that expand their understanding of real-world extreme fire behavior. Ideally, this would be done without actually exposing firefighters to the hazards of extreme fire behavior by taking advantage of learning opportunities such as prescribed fires, fire simulations, fire drills, and videos of extreme fire behavior. Experiential Training Opportunities Since a prescribed fire is simply a wildland fire that is intentionally ignited at a chosen time under somewhat controlled conditions, next to actual wildfires, prescribed fires are by far the best place to acquire the variety and quantity of experiences that make up a firefighter’s mental slide collection. Extensive prescribed fire experience in various fuel, terrain, and weather conditions should be a mandatory and significant aspect of wildland firefighter supervisor training.

Center Manager Center Manager San Dimas Technology & Development Center Missoula Technology & Development Center 444 East Bonita Ave. 5785 Hwy. 10 West San Dimas, CA 91773-3198 Missoula, MT 59808-9361 Phone: 909-599-1267 0371-2M05-MTDC Phone: 406-329-3900 Fax: 909-592-2309 (Rev. 6/04) Fax: 406-329-3719 Simulations are an excellent tool for developing a firefighter’s mental “slides.” Types of useful fire simulations range from simple and inexpensive sand table exercises to complex and expensive computer aided simulations in purpose-built facilities. Although they are a somewhat recent innovation, computer aided fire simulations are a very effective training tool. Because this technology is still evolving, and because of the expense of facilities and electronic simulator equipment, and the number of personnel it takes to support quality simulations, the Forest Service currently has a very limited wildland fire computer aided simulator capability. Fire drills are a form of experiential learning tool that have been used successfully for many years. Drills let firefighters practice necessary firefighter skills in a controlled environment, which increases the likelihood that an individual firefighter will remember the practiced skills and respond correctly when confronted with a similar challenge in the future. The frequency of drills affects their usefulness; generally, the less time elapsed between a drill and a real-life similar occurrence, or the more times the drill was repeated, the better the drill’s lessons will be remembered and applied. Many fire shelter deployment survivors have reported that the skills and knowledge they acquired from fire shelter deployment drills helped them survive their entrapments. Videos of extreme fire behavior provide an excellent medium for expanding firefighters’ awareness of how fast and far a fire can move under certain conditions. Since many firefighters have the ability to take videos while on fires, and extreme fire behavior events are an attractive subject, there are literally thousands of videos out there that could be used to enhance firefighter awareness of extreme fire behavior. PROPOSED TECHNOLOGY & DEVELOPMENT WORK (Describe your concept of the end product, such as a new equipment design, a PowerPoint presentation, a video, a handbook, Web site, CD, etc.): Assign social scientists to study how experienced firefighters assess and avoid threats posed by sudden increases in fire behavior. If this portion of the study reveals that the wildland fire RPD threat avoidance model is valid, then firefighters of all experience levels should be studied to see if they actually possess sufficient “tools” to assess and avoid threats posed by sudden increases in fire behavior. The Region 5 Wildland Fire Training Center in Sacramento has pioneered the use of computer aided simulators for training wildland firefighters. Although the program has been relatively successful, the number of personnel that can be cycled through the WFTC wildland fire simulations is limited by infrastructure. Using the Region 5 model as an example for the other regions, the Forest Service should develop similar computer aided simulator facilities in each region. To help alleviate a critical gap in fire knowledge and reduce instances of underestimation of fire behavior, the Forest Service should support the creation of an extreme fire behavior documentation unit and comprehensive video library. The goal of this unit would be to seek out opportunities to capture raw video of various types of extreme fire behavior and create informative videos for a library that would be accessible to all wildland firefighters. Such videos would provide an additional and important form of experiential learning for wildland firefighters. The Wildland Fire Lessons Learned Center would be a

Center Manager Center Manager San Dimas Technology & Development Center Missoula Technology & Development Center 444 East Bonita Ave. 5785 Hwy. 10 West San Dimas, CA 91773-3198 Missoula, MT 59808-9361 Phone: 909-599-1267 0371-2M05-MTDC Phone: 406-329-3900 Fax: 909-592-2309 (Rev. 6/04) Fax: 406-329-3719 logical choice to host an extreme fire behavior documentation unit and video library, and to develop educational videos on extreme fire behavior. An excellent example of an informative video on extreme fire behavior was produced in 2013 by the Rocky Mountain Research Station and the Missoula Fire Sciences Laboratory. The video, entitled “Deadly Beauty,” uses edited video and narration from fire behavior scientists and firefighters to educate firefighters about the dangers of large firewhirls, and the fuel, terrain, and weather conditions that are likely to precede the development of large firewhirls. This is the link to the “Deadly Beauty” video: http://www.youtube.com/watch? v=wEpW24WIgR8&list=PLTjug05B4KNuFgqSJ6_YgrKIMntieTHuP&index=1

POTENTIAL BENEFITS (Describe how this project will reduce cost, save time, improve safety, increase efficiency, or improve resource management): This proposal will improve safety by insuring that senior leadership and fire managers understand the value of Recognition Primed Decision-making, and by insuring that firefighters get the right kind and amount of training needed to develop fire behavior threat recognition and avoidance skills. At present, the contribution of experiential learning to wildland firefighter safety is under-appreciated and not supported by written policy. Consequently, a need for increased experiential learning is not perceived as a priority by agency leaders and policymakers. Codification of Recognition Primed Decision-making as a core wildland firefighting training principle would insure that experiential training receives the emphasis it deserves. It should be recognized that increasing experiential learning opportunities to the degree required to significantly reduce incidences of firefighter entrapments and/or burnovers will require the Forest Service to commit long-term funding and support to this initiative. This proposal to increase opportunities for Forest Service firefighters to participate in prescribed fires, fire simulations and fire drills, and to use extreme fire behavior videos as educational tools, should not be perceived as a conflict with present classroom training that Forest Service firefighters already receive. The current curriculums of S, I, A, L, and other courses are valuable and necessary components of the training firefighters need to perform their jobs. But without a wide range of experiential training and sufficient on-the-job experience, Forest Service firefighters will not be able to develop the mental “slides” they need to avoid entrapments in every conceivable fire situation.

Center Manager Center Manager San Dimas Technology & Development Center Missoula Technology & Development Center 444 East Bonita Ave. 5785 Hwy. 10 West San Dimas, CA 91773-3198 Missoula, MT 59808-9361 Phone: 909-599-1267 0371-2M05-MTDC Phone: 406-329-3900 Fax: 909-592-2309 (Rev. 6/04) Fax: 406-329-3719