FIRE ACRONYMS & ABBREVIATIONS
Dedicated to the persistence of those who seek to
understand. Remember, even if you don't know all the acronyms that fire people may use,
Abercrombie said on 7/14/98, "This page is and will remain committed to those who
leave the paved roads and highways to attack wildland fires at their source. And, of
course, to all those committed individuals who support them."
A note from
Tiny the R-6 Fire-Pup in 2000: Greetings all, the
acronyms below are by NO means a complete list of the acronyms related to fire, some are also
miscellaneous acronyms used to shorten speech, or briefly convey thoughts, and there are a few
computer based. If you have additional acronyms you think should be added, mail
and Ab will be glad to include it/them.
||The 10 Standard Fire Fighting Orders
|18 Watch Outs
||The 18 Watchout Situations
||Incident Status Summary covering the previous 24 hour period of large escaped fire, contains incident name, location, area involved, costs, containment, control, weather, resources, acres, etc.
||Air Attack: Light aircraft (airplane or helicopter) that carries the
ATGS; also Slang for Affirmative Action
||Association of AirTanker Pilots
||After Action Review, informally and professionally conducted in search of lessons learned,
usually by the crew involved who provide verbal feedback to each other and
going no further, as no written record is kept; not for
investigative purposes but to aid crews in continuously improving themselves.
It's one tool for gaining candid insights into specific firefighter, leader,
unit and systemic strengths and weaknesses from various perspectives. -
Feedback and insight critical to actions that were not standard operating
procedures, or those that presented safety problems. Information usually does not get into the wider field.
From AAR to SAI
Hierarchy of Analysis/Investigation for a Learning Organization: AAR
--> FLA --> APA --> SAI
|Fire size class
||So ABC Misc or
is a collection of
very small to
|0 - 1/4 acre
1/4 - 10
10 - 99
|100 - 299
300 - 999
1000 - 4999
||Area Command, see ACT and UAC.
||Aviation Conference in Education
||Area Command Team, typically assigned to regions experiencing high numbers of
simultaneous fires, not necessarily being in the same complex.
||Administratively Determined, a category of temporary employment on a fire. The
number denotes the level of pay. A person hired and compensated under the
Pay Plan for Emergency Workers. (casual or emergency)
||Americans with Disabilities Act
||Automatic Direction Finder; An aircraft radio navigational receiver
operating in the low frequency bands.
||The AD Firefighter Association, a non-profit organization that represents all AD EFF
Firefighters and AD EFF Crews (AD 1 through 5) concerning issues of pay, training,
||Aerial Delivered Firefighter Study
||Assistant District Fire Management Officer
||Automated External Defibrillator
||Almador-El Dorado Unit of CAL FIRE.
||Air Force Base
||Assistant Fire Equipment Operator (on an engine) also known as an assistant engineer
||Automated Flight Following
||American Federation of Government Employees (AFL-CIO), firefighter
union; with NFFE, could be supplanted by IAFF (primary AFL-CIO firefighter
local) under Employee Free Choice Act; discussion 3/25/09 theysaid
||Assistant Fire Management Officer
||Those who were following the thread when this acronym came up, or know the helitack
scene, know it is an abbreviation for "Arroyo Grande" the
helicopter/helirappeller base on the Los
Padres NF in CA.
||Above Ground Level. Any fixed wing aircraft certified by the FAA as being capable of
transport and delivery of fire suppressant solutions.
||All-Hazard Incident Management Team; discussed on 3/9/09 theysaid;
AHIMT Conference Findings (1444 K pdf file; 53 pages)
||Aerial Ignition Device: Inclusive term applied to equipment designed to
ignite wildland fuels from an aircraft. Includes: Delayed Aerial
Ignition Devices ; Helitorch ; Ping-Pong Ball System ; Plastic Sphere
||Aviation Information Management System, a CDF computer program used to track tanker
air time, retardant loads, pilot time, and costs
||Aerial Infrared Imaging System used by CDF for flying and imaging fireline and
||Aircraft Network: Applies to radio frequencies primarily used for air
||Annual Leave, personal time off accrued in amounts each pay period depending on length
||Automatic Lightning Detection System: An electronic system that detects
cloud-to-ground lightning strikes by their electrical discharges and plots
||Advanced Life Support means paramedics or possibly EMT-II's. ALS care providers
(paramedics and above) can -besides do everything EMTs do- start IVs, give you drugs,
read an electrocardiogram (heart monitor), and defibrillate (shock) you. Most crews have
one or two EMT qualified members, but paramedics are pretty scarce, and without their
respective toolkits, they can only do the basics. See also BLS.
||As in AM and FM, types of radio broadcasts; also as in AM and PM, morning and
||Aviation Mishap Information System including SafeComs procedure (See Links Page)
||Appropriate Management Response for fire mgmt flexibility. FS National
strategy beginning in 2007; for example whether a fire or part of a fire
should have a perimeter control strategy or a suppression strategy or a
wildland fire use strategy, etc.; NPS already has AMR.
||Angeles National Forest unit identifier
||Annual Operating Plan (for Fire Weather) A procedural guide which
describes fire meteorological services provided within the Geographic Area
of responsibility, including the NIFC. The guide is based on the National
Interagency Agreement and applicable Geographic Area Memorandum of
||Accident Prevention Analysis is an accident investigation tool
that promotes a learning culture; useful in promoting more widespread
organizational Lessons Learned that is based on a storytelling approach
using an accident narrative; to create the narrative, witnesses are
interviewed by experts; their information is confidential unless it becomes
clear there was "reckless and willful disregard for human safety"; the APA
identifies causal latent flaws within the organization and usually results
in recommendations for the agency to correct them to become a safer
organization (HRO). Example: the APA of the Little Venus Incident or the
Balls Canyon Incident.
From AAR to SAI
Hierarchy of Analysis/Investigation for a Learning Organization: AAR --> FLA
--> APA --> SAI
Contrast FLA and SAI (Serious Accident Investigation, an administrative
review with witness statements and individual consequences, potentially
including policy outcomes.)
||Accident Prevention Analysis Team (has a team leader like the SAIT)
||Air Pollution Control District, exists at the county or district level
||Administrative Payment Team: A team that supports incident agencies by
processing payments for resources. Resources may include emergency
equipment, casuals, local vendors for supplies, etc.
||Animal-Plant-Health Inspection Service. Division of Department of Agriculture.
||Air Quality Review Board
||Adjective Rating, a public info component of the NFDRS specific to fire danger:
low, moderate, high, very high, extreme.
||Air Resources Board, exists at the state level, for example see CARB
||Aircraft Rescue Fire Fighting
||Air Route Traffic Control Centers (Link not available because of
national security concerns.)
||Air Stagnation Advisory
||Automated Staffing Application Program of the FS fire hire
||A BLM-administered, interagency system used as the interagency method of
retrieving data from GOES satellites and forwarding to WIMS. It is used for
metadata storage and maintenance documentation, and it produces a data
||Albuquerque Service Center; FS Finance was stovepiped and moved to
Albuquerque at the cost of $400M, which was paid for with congressionally
allocated fire funds (2005, 2006)
||Assistant state forest ranger, CDF. Original titles were the top man in
the county was the Ranger, next level was Associate Ranger then the
Assistant Ranger. Later that was changed to Ranger IV down to Ranger I. The
titles now are Unit Chief, Deputy Chief, Assistant Chief and Battalion
||Aerial Supervision Module, light twin-engine airplane that combines the
lead plane function and tactical supervision (pilot and air tactical group
supervisor (ATGS), 2 people).
||Aircraft Rental Agreement
||Archaeological Resources Protection Act of 1979; example of training:
ARPA - Crime Scene Investigation
||Actual time of arrival: Term used in flight planning/following to
document time of arrival at a point. (Also used to communicate arrival time
of other resources.)
||Actual time of departure: Term used in flight planning/following to
document time of departure from a point. (Also used to communicate departure
time of other resources.)
||Actual time en route: Term used in flight planning/following to document
actual time spent flying (or driving) between points.
||Air Tactical Group Supervisor - the Air Attack Officer in the air who's directing the
lead planes, tankers, and helicopters to do what the groundpounders need (want). See
the Redcard mnemonics page, link at the top of this page.
||Atmospheric Theodolite Meteorological Unit
||Air Tactical Pilot
||All terrain vehicle: Any motorized vehicle designed for or capable of
cross-country travel on or immediately over land, water, sand, snow, ice,
marsh, swampland, or other terrain. Off-Road Vehicle
||Avuedigitalservices.com a site where you can apply digitally for some fire jobs.
In hiring year '00-01, they were supposed to have scannable Form C available for the
FS fire jobs application process and did not. Also AVUE the software program
purchased by the WO and potentially being used in hiring year '01-02.
||Automatic Weather Station: A non-GOES telemetered weather station that
provides hourly observations to a local database
||Absent without leave.
# AB CDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWX
||Burned Area Emergency Rehabilitation
||Brush Disposal, funding from legacy funds for the Forest Service
||San Bernardino National Forest unit identifier
||Battle Dress Utility. It is a specific style
"cut" of the current nomex pant the National Cache system is changing to.
Patterned after the Vietnam military pants where the user has a greater
mobility in hiking and can carry a variety of gear in the over-sized
pockets. Everyone loves them and they are being manufactured by vendors
other than the national contract in various colors.
||San Bernardino Unit of CAL FIRE.
||San Benito-Monterey Unit of CAL FIRE
||Blinding Glimpse of the Obvious, describes the feeling many novices get
when taking Doug Campbell's Fire Signature Prediction method. First
described by Pulaski on theysaid in the late 90s.
||Burn Index, predicted fire behavior measured using current and past
weather data, heavily influenced by wind speed, and a term of the NFDRS.
||Bureau of Indian Affairs, Department of Interior. See Links page.
||Boise Interagency Fire Center, now called National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC)
||Burns Interagency Fire Zone
||A kind of radio
||Boiling Liquid Expanding Vapor Explosion (eg, propane tank explosion):
1) The failure of a closed container as a result of
overpressurization caused by an external heat source.
2) A major failure of a closed liquid container into
two or more pieces when the temperature of the liquid is well above its
boiling point at normal atmospheric pressure.
||Bureau of Land Management, Department of Interior,
BLM Fire and Aviation
||Basic Life Support generally means EMTs, which can only perform "non-invasive"
procedures, ie no sticking you with needles or putting tubes down your throat, just band
aids, oxygen, maybe a splint or two, and in the worst case, some good ol' CPR.
See also ALS.
||Boise Mobile Equipment, designs, markets, and manufactures engines and other fire
||R5 FAM Board of Directors (FMOs of the 18 national forests in CA)
||Bend Over Here It Comes Again, a military acronym.
||Big Ol' Titty Squeezin' Hug, an acronym used in chat.
||Boise International Airport
||Blue Ribbon Panel like a large After Action Review with recommendations,
especially referring to the BRP on the aging C130 and PB4Y firefighting
aircraft in 2003; and the BRP following the 2003 SoCal Firestorm.
||Butte Unit of CAL FIRE.
Also British Thermal Unit, Amount of heat required to raise 1 pound of water
1 degree Fahrenheit (from 59.50 to 60.50 F), measured at standard
||By the way
||Basic Underwater Demolition/ Seal has a good fitness program, see
||Buildup Index: A relative measure of the cumulative effect of daily
drying factors and precipitation on fuels with a ten-day timelag.
# ABC DEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWX
||California Interagency Incident Management Team. For links to the CIIMTs, see:
see Type 1 IMTs and Type 2 IMTs.
||Computer Aided Dispatch
||Compressed Air Foam Systems (allows firefighters to "foam and go" rather
than sticking around to protect a home), consists of an air compressor (or
air source), a water pump, and foam solution.
||California All Incident Reporting System
||California Smoke and Air Consortium, demonstrating burn days
||California Dozer Operator Group
Management Agency (formerly Office of Emergency Services)
||California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, "red engines".
Interactive map with contact phone numbers. Pdf file of
operational unit boundaries
||California Multi-Agency Command; the information coordination center
established in Sacramento. Tasked to gather timely information from regions,
cooperating agencies, the media the director, interested govt leaders and
||California Air Resources Board.
||Congressional Budget Office. from theysaid 10/31-11/1/07: CBO provides
oversight and offers suggestions on the budget for the legislative branch,
primarily Congress. Thus, OMB acting as an agent of the President sets the
budget direction that the executive branch adheres to...... CBO tries to
fact check those figures and tries to see if those figures make sense when
they advise the Congressionals on budget decisions.
||California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation; provide CalFire
inmate fire crews; inmate crews annually spend three million hours fighting
fires, saving taxpayers $80 million a year.
||California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, "red engines".
See Links page.
||Slang for Consent Decree.
||California Department of Forestry Firefighters --
CDF Union (affiliated with CPF and IAFF)
||Commercial Driver's License -- required for certain emergency vehicles. Also
California Driver's License.
||California Department of Forestry-Local Watershed Contract; for example, within
Orange County are lands within the City of Anaheim for which the City contracts
directly with CDF to provide local watershed fire response within Anaheim's "Local
Responsibility Area". See theysaid post by Contract County Guy on 11/11/03.
||President's Council on Environmental Quality
||Cluster F***, a descriptive military term saved to describe an *extreme* screw
up done to a number of people
||Country Fire Authority
of Victoria Australia
||California Fire Assistance Agreement, a mutual aid agreement, formerly
known as the Five Party Agreement or the Four Party Agreement; an agreement
for wildland fire suppression entered into by the State of California: OES
and CalFire; and the federal: FS, BLM, NPS, FWS. ICS and NIMS policy must be
||California Fuels Committee
||"controlled flight into terrain," when pilots flying in smoke, thick
clouds or darkness lose their bearing and fly the aircraft into the ground
||Cooperative Fire Protection: A staff unit within the branch of State and
Private Forestry or Aviation and Fire Management in the National Forest
System, USDA Forest Service, that coordinates cooperative fire activities.
||Cooperative Fire Protection Agreement
||Code of Federal Regulations.
||Congressional Fire Services Institute
||Reference an individual forest's Continuity of Operations Plan, 2012
(COOP): Critical Function Team, a pre-selected team which acts as
liaison between the CRT and critical function units.
||Community Fire Units
in Australia. A group of volunteer local residents trained to protect
their own home from bush fires while they await arrival of the NSWFB. Usually
established in areas of urban/bushland interface.
Introduced in Aussie CFU's post of 5/15/02.
||Chains per hour; a chain is 66 feet.
||Comprehensive Health Service, a company that arranges the medical
screening for the WCT. Suspended in early March '09.
||Short for "chains" a measure of distance on a fire line.
Equals 66 feet.
||Aviation abbreviation for Chico Air Field, Chico CA.
||Comfort Incident Commander, what Sammi calls herself as she helps her 6 firefighting
kids get their gear, etc. organized and tracks their assignments. See the beginning of
familysaid (08/18/01) to read her description.
||California Incident Command Qualification System. See theysaid
||Crisis ? (Something about facilities)
||Critical Incident Stress Debriefing following highly stressful events
such as deaths, accidents, and near misses, firefighters participate in
counseling with the purpose of receiving emotional and psychological
||Cyanide, see also Hydrogen Cyanide HCN a HAZMAT
||Cleveland National Forest unit identifier.
||California Northern Region, in contrast with CSR - California Southern
Cal Fire breaks California into two parts of the state for controlling
||Carbon Monoxide (colorless, odorless, poisonous HAZMAT gas produced by
incomplete fuel combustion.) or Colorado (the state) or Contracting Officer
(person that arranges and monitors contracts)
||Carbon Dioxide: colorless, odorless, nonpoisonous gas, which results
from fuel combustion and is normally a part of the ambient air.
||Cost of Living Allowance used to equalize salaries based on cost of living
in different geographic areas
||Cooperative Fire Assistance - CA - Cooperative Fire Program assistance to
state, local govt and communities
||Contracting Officers Representative
||Close of Season, as in rolling up the hose, sharpening the hand
tools, winterizing the pumps; alternatively, reference an individual
forest's Continuity of Operations Plan, 2012 (COOP): Critical Operations
Staff, forest staff responsible for critical operations.
||An insurance agency providing medical benefits for temporary employees.
||California Professional Firefighters, an organization
||Campbell Prediction System, information found at
www.dougsfire.com. See Programs page.
||Cut To Length, a kind of timber harvester
||Crew Resource Management. It was developed in the 70's by the airline
industry to combat a growing number of 'pilot error' crashes. The basic
principle of CRM is that everyone from the top to the bottom has a voice in
||Can't Remember Syndrome, coined by FirenWater, similar in symptoms to
"Oldtimers" Syndrome that Hickman has described so well.
||Reference an individual forest's Continuity of Operations Plan, 2012
(COOP): Critical Response Team, the pre-selected team who directs the
forest’s response to an unforeseen emergency.
||California State Employees Association. Many CDF employees are members of this
||California Southern Region, in contrast with CNR - California Northern
Cal Fire breaks California into two parts of the state for controlling
also sometimes Customer Service Reps
Civil Service Retirement System
||Crew Time Report, filled out daily and submitted to the Time Unit on large fires
||California Wildfire Coordinatiion Group
||Call When Needed, refers to aircraft that have a call when needed
contract with an agency.
||Community Wildfire Protection Plan: developed in the collaborative
framework established by the Wildland Fire Leadership Council and agreed to
by state, tribal, and local government, local fire department, other
stakeholders and federal land mgmt agencies managing land in the vicinity of
the planning area. Identifies and prioritizes areas for hazardous fuel
reduction treatments. Recommends the types and methods of treatment on Fed
and non-Fed land that will protect at-risk communities and essential
infrastructure. Recommends measures to reduce structural ignitability
throughout the community. May address issues such as wildfire response,
hazard mitigation, community preparedness, or structure protection.
||Slang for "see you" or "cover your a**", or California
Youth Authority, depending on
||San Mateo-Santa Cruz unit of CAL FIRE.
# ABCD EFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWX
||Departure from Avg Greenness: An NDVI-derived image of vegetation
greenness compared to its average greenness for the current week of the
||Delayed Aerial Ignition Device
||Dog and Pony Show
||Designated Agency Safety and Health Official
||Downdraft Convective Available Potential Energy relating to released
moisture in buildup and collapse of colums.See 9/11/07 theysaid or read: Dr.
Brian E. Potter,“The role of released moisture in the atmospheric
dynamics associated with wildland fires”. Potter, Brian E.,
International Journal of Wildland Fire, 2005, 14, 77-84.
The 1500 acre Dude Fire in heavy dry Ponderosa Pine fuels would have
released on the order of 5 million kilograms of water from combustion into
the plume in an otherwise dry air mass from about 6:00 a.m. up to the
downburst at about 2:00 p.m.
||District Fire Management Officer
||Dispatch related courses. See course information below.
||Diameter at Breast Height (a tree's)
||Demonstration, wherein a job position is being announced and open to all citizens, not just
the same agency or current federal employees (which would be Merit or some other category).
||Duty Fire Management Officer or District Fire Management Officer, depending on context.
||Department of Homeland Security
||Distributed Incident Simulation Exercise: on-line mission rehearsal
event providing an individual or team with an experiential learning
environment utilizing the National Interagency Incident Management System to
"game" a computer generated incident from multiple training locations.
(Examples: CBT/WBT Forest Service Wildland Fire Simulation Scenario Editor)
||Department of Natural Resources, often prefaced by a State name.
||Domain Name System, the method used to convert Internet names to their
corresponding Internet numbers
||Department of Agriculture, parent of the USFS; DoA = Delegation of
Authority; also, possibly, Dead on Arrival
||Depth of Burn: reduction in forest floor thickness due to fire
||Department of Commerce;
Operations Center (NIMS)
||Department of Defense
||Department of Energy
||Department of Forestry, often referred to with state abbreviation as a prefix,
e.g., FLDOF, Florida Department of Forestry
Dozer Operators Group (DOGs), this group has been around for
many years. It is made up of paid professional Fire Dozer Operators and
professional Contractors who fight fire.
||Department of Interior, parent of the BIA, BLM, NPS, FWS
||Department of Lands from familysaid
||Direct Fire Protection Area. That area for which a particular fire
protection organization has the primary responsibility for attacking an
uncontrolled fire and for directing the suppression action.
FRA - Federal Responsibility Area: National Forest Land, National
Park Lands, BLM Public Lands, National Wildlife refuges, Military
SRA- State Responsibility Area: Watershed lands designated by the
State legislature. These include State Parks but more often are private
lands that have watershed characteristics. These lands are always
unincorporated, outside of City jurisdictions.
LRA- Local Responsibility Area: These lands are private lands outside
of watershed areas designated by the state, or lands incorporated into
||Department of Transportation
||Drop point on a fire. Drop points are numbered and mark locations on a fire where
people meet, equipment is exchanged, and resources may be stationed.
||Decision Support System for cost containment of large fires; described
briefly by Old Sawyer on 3/17/09
||Doublewide, a trailer
||Drop Zone: Target area for airtankers, helitankers, cargo dropping.
# ABCDE FGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWX
||Extended Attack or
Environmental Assessment (authorized by the National Environmental Policy
Act (NEPA) of 1969). They are concise analytical documents prepared with
public input that determine if an Environmental Impact Statement is needed
for a project or action. If an EIS is not needed, the EA becomes the doc
allowing agency compliance with the NEPA requirements.
||Eastern Area Coordination Center (see GACC)
||Environmental Analysis Document
||Employee Assistance Program for FS employees.
||Emergency Alert System, established by the FCC; using digital equipment,
it replaces the old Emergency Broadcast System (EBS) as a tool to warn the public about
||Emergency Command Center (or Communications Center)
||One of the two major Weather Prediction Models; the other is GFS; don't
know what the letters stand for.
||Emergency Employee or Emergency Hire, some are on call.
Education Network (FEMA)
||Equal Employment Opportunity
||Effectiveness, Efficiency and Performance Measures (EEPs) The national
trade-off analysis module in the FPA system enables fire budget
decision-makers to assess trade-offs between investment alternatives in
terms of multiple fire-related Effectiveness, Efficiency and Performance
Measures (EEPs) at different proposed budget levels. (See FPA.)
||Emergency Equipment Rental Agreement, the agreement for equipment not
on a national contract engines, tenders, trucks, bikes (showers, caterers, helicopters
have a national contract RFP or RFQ).
||Emergency Fire Fighter fund for use on large fires, also kind of crew
paid from those funds. Related tp the duration of the emergency only.
||Emission Factor: The mass of particulate matter produced per unit mass
of fuel consumed (pounds perton, grams per kg).
||Escaped Fire Situation Analysis
||Eastern Great Basin Coordination Center (see GACC)
||Environmental Impact Statement, may be needed to comply with NEPA.
||Emergency Locator Transmitter: adio transmitter attached to the aircraft
structure which operates from its own power source on 121.5 MHz and 243 MHz.
The transmitter transmits a distinctive downward swept audio tone for homing
purposes and is designed to function without human action after an accident.
||Emergency Management Australia, referenced during the AU fires of 2009
(eg 2/18/09 theysaid).
Management Assistance Compact (NIMS)
||Moisture content that a fuel particle will attain if exposed for an
infinite period in an environment of specified constant temperature and
humidity. When a fuel particle reaches equilibrium moisture content, net
exchange of moisture between it and its environment is zero.
||Emergency Medical Service EMSA (Emergency Medical Services Authority)
||Emergency Medical Services Authority discussion centered around SoCal
||Emergency Medical Technician, see also ALS and BLS.
EMTB- basic; EMTI- intermediate; EMTP- paramedic
||Electrocardiogram, a measure of cardiovascular fitness
||Exotic Newcastle's Disease, a virus that infects chickens.
||Eldorado National Forest unit identifier.
||Emergency Operations Centers, part of the ICS, also called Expanded Dispatch, Emergency
Command and Control Centers, etc. EOCs are used in various ways at all levels of government
and within private industry to provide coordination, direction, and control during
emergencies. EOC facilities can be used to house Area Command and MACS activities as
determined by agency or jurisdiction policy.
||Enhanced Outreach System for hiring FS employees in R5
||Environmental Protection Agency
Preparedness and Response Directorate under the Dept of Homeland Security; formerly FEMA
||Energy Release Component a term of the NFDRS; index is used by wildland
fire specialists and is considered the best indicator of the effects of
long-term drying on fire behavior, specifically = computed total heat
release per unit area (British thermal units per square foot) within the
flaming front at the head of a moving fire.
||A CDF acronym, Emergency Resource Directory. CDF does not have to get
position task books signed off as firefighters do in the federal redcard
system. "Another CDF BC" pointed out on 11/9/03 that their
system works well too. "In order to get a call that takes you out of
county, you have to be blessed by the unit management. In other words, you must prove
competency among your peers and supervisors."
||Reference an individual forest's Continuity of Operations Plan, 2012
(COOP): Emergency Relocation Facility, where operations will be
carried out when the home facility is not available
||Endangered Species Act.
||Emergency Support Function. What has to be dealt with by FEMA or some
organizational leader in an disaster. See Lobotomy's post on theysaid
9/15/05. Note: Under the National Response Plan (DHS & FEMA), the
Forest Service is the lead Fed agency for the Firefighting ESF. The FS also
lends assistance to state and Fed partners under ICS.
in contrast with ERF =
Response Function (local)
||Environmental Systems Research Institute. A software company in southern CA
that specializes in GIS (Geographic Information
Systems) mapping of fires and fire-related phenomena for analysis and
display. They provided good
info during the SoCal Firestorm of '03.
||Estimated Time of Arrival. Term used in resource planning/following to
estimate time of arrival at a point.
||Estimated Time of Departure: Term used in resource planning/following to
estimate time of departure from a point.
||Estimated Time EnRoute: Term used in resource planning/following to
estimate time spent between points.
||Exclusive use contract, refers to aircraft that have an exclusive use
contact with an agency.
# ABCDEF GHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWX
||Federal Aviation Administration
||Fire and Aviation Management of the USDA FS
||Fatality Assessment and Control Evaluation Program; example of report
||Fire Apparatus Engineer (Driver)
||Forest Aviation Officer
||Frequently Asked Questions
||Federal Aviation Regulations: Regulations governing all aviation
activities of civil aircraft within the United States and its territories.
||Fire and Aviation Safety Team
||Sites that produce fire weather forecasts
(example FRESNO-FAT) in 2012, with our level of instant information, fire
managers ask for Spot Fire Forecasts.
||Fire Behavior Analyst. For the complete list of Redcard mnemonics
for wildland fire positions, see the link at the top of the page.
||Fire Captain (Engine or station Foreman) CDF
||Federal Communications Commission, for example FCC has specs for radios and frequencies
used on fires.
||Fire Captain range B or Crew Captain (Crew Supervisor) CDF
||Fire Department of New York
||Federal Employee Compensation Act, the current act that governs whether
employees are covered for workman's compensation and disability. As it
stands, federal fire fighters must be able to pinpoint the precise incident or
exposure that caused a disease in order for it to be considered job-related.
This is hard to do. See 8/18/03 theysaid for the text of the Presumptive
||as in FEDERAL GUVMINT
||Federal Employees Group Life Insurance
Fire Effects Information System
(using the Way Back Machine and screen captures from 2005) is a computerized
encyclopedia of information describing the fire ecology of more than 1,000
plant and animal species and plant communities.
||Forestry Equipment Mechanic, one of the two CDF primary classifications for its mechanics. See
Heavy Equipment Mechanic (HEM) for more info.
Emergency Management Administration,
now with the Dept of Homeland Security called the "Emergency Preparedness and Response
||Fire Effects Monitor
||Fire Equipment Operator on an engine, also called Engineer
||Federal Excess Property Program, see links page to get there.
Employees Retirement System
||Fire Equipment Working Team
||Federal Fire and Aviation Leadership Council, wildland firefighting
agencies' leadership, comprised of the Federal wildland firefighting agency Fire Directors
(Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management, National Park Service, Bureau of Indian Affairs,
Fish and Wildlife Service) in cooperation with a representative from the National
Association of State Foresters (NASF).
||Federal Fire and Aviation Safety Team
||Financial Foundation Information System, a way of figuring direct and indirect costs for
fire using the system provided by this FFIS company
||Fire and fuels management
||Fire Fighting Production Capability
||Forest Fire Management Officer
||Fort Hunter Liggett
||Federal Interagency Communication Center (in Southern CA)
||Fire Information Officer - person who deals with the news media
||Fire Information Retrieval and Evaluation System
||The Fire Sciences Lab (FiSL), an arm of the Rocky Mountain Research Station located
in Missoula, MT, is home to the Fire Behavior Project, Fire Chemistry Project, and the
Fire Effects Project.
||Fresno-Kings Unit of CAL FIRE.
||Fire Load Index, a term of the NFDRS.
||Facilitated Learning Analysis, one of the tools for achieving Lessons
Learned in which the intent, thought and action leading up to the incident
are explored in a group debriefing and facilitated with sandtable props and
strategic evocative questions; a report is optional and it may or may not
provide recommendations. It's a "portal" type of experience. Example: the
FLA of the Nuttall Complex Incident.
From AAR to SAI
Hierarchy of Analysis/Investigation for a Learning Organization: AAR -->
FLA --> APA --> SAI
In contrast with AAR and APA a more formal interview process developing a
storytelling report with recommendations.
||Fireline Explosives: Specially developed coils containing explosive
powder that are detonated to create a fireline through ground fuels.
||Federal Law Enforcement Training Center
||Forward Looking Infrared, a hand held or aircraft mounted device designed to detect
heat differentials and display the images on a video screen. Not affected by smoke.
FLIRs have thermal resolution similar to IR line scanners, but their spatial
resolution is substantially less; commonly used to detect hot spots and
flareups obscured by smoke, evaluate the effectiveness of firing operations,
or detect areas needing mopup.
||Fire Line Hand Book put out by NWCG.
||Federal Land Policy Management Act
||Federal Labor Relations Authority
||Fair Labor Standards Act
||As in AM and FM, types of radio broadcasts
||Fire Management Assistance Grant: The FMAG program's intent is to allow local and
state govts a means to aggressively attack and suppress fires with the assurance
they will not drain their local budgets protecting life and property. If this
program did not exist, local govt fire agencies and most state fire agencies
would be VERY hesitant to commit resources and have no chance of re-imbursement.
In CA, we have without a doubt the finest cooperative fire service in
the world, supported by this very program.
||Fire Management Officer, may be referred to as District or Forest.
||Fire Management Plan; similarly at the national level, the Federal
Wildland Fire Management Plan or FWFMP
A plan which identifies and integrates all wildland fire management and
related activities within the context of approved land/resource management
plans. It defines a program to manage wildland fires (wildfire, prescribed
fire, and wildland fire use). The plan is supplemented by operational plans,
including but not limited to preparedness plans, preplanned dispatch plans,
and prevention plans. Fire Management Plans assure that wildland fire
management goals and components are coordinated.
||Forest Management Team
||Fire Management Unit: land management area definable by objectives,
management constraints, topographic features, access, values to be
protected, political boundaries, fuel types, major fire regime groups, etc.
that set it apart from the characteristics of an adjacent FMU. The FMU may
have dominant management objectives and pre-selected strategies assigned to
accomplish these objectives.
||for slang F*ing New Guy
||First Order Fire Effects: The effects that concern the direct or
immediate consequences of fire, such as biomass consumption, crown scorch,
bole damage, and smoke production. First order effects form an important
basis for predicting secondary effects such as tree regeneration, plant
succession, and changes in site productivity, but these involve interaction
with many other non-fire variables. Check SOFE.
||Field Operation Guide (NIMS)
||Freedom of Information Act
||Federal On Scene Coordinator, as for an emergency like a hurricane or a
||Informal acronym used on this site several times, refers to Fire on the Mountain,
a book about those who died on Storm King Mountain in Colorado in 1994 by John Maclean
||Fire Management Assistance Grant. A fed assistance program managed by
FEMA through the state Office of Emergency Services. This program is
designed to help state and/or local jurisdictions impacted by high cost,
high damage wildland fires.
||Fire Management Plan, a strategic plan that defines a program to manage
wildland and prescribed fires and documents the Fire Management Program in
the approved land use plan. The plan is supplemented by operational plans
such as preparedness plans, preplanned dispatch plans, prescribed fire
plans and prevention plans.
||Fire Management Unit
||F-ing New Guy, military term
||Fire Program Analysis, the new system that replaces NFMAS; came about
because OPM said NFMAS was too expensive (2004). It's a political solution.
NFMAS was based on a tactical model of past fires dictating need. FPA is
based on a strategic model which is not related to real fire need. They're
looking to cut costs regardless of real need. FPA is like a train going down
the track, throttle open with track un-laid half a mile ahead. Tom
Harbour told the R5 BOD in 2005 when the cost was about 3 or 4 million
dollars: "We know it isn't working and it isn't likely to, but we have to
look like we're trying." Update, 2007: Still a Wannabe planning tool:
Program has had lots of glitches and, at the cost of 17 million, is still
side-lined in 2007.
||Another loose meaning on theysaid: FPA has sometimes been used in discussions
of a hypothetical Fire Protection Agency, as in
National Fire Protection Agency, possibly comprised of FS, BLM, NPS, FWS,
and BIA. Not yet established.
||Fire Program Analysis; wanna be alternative to NFMAS for planning
Program Analysis System using the Way Back Machine, August 07
||Fire Protection District
||Fire Planning Unit, the unit of organization on which FPA is based, also
called a <unit geographic name> GIS Cooperative; no longer includes only the
Forest and its fire resources, but also includes adjoining National Parks,
BLM and BIA land with their resources. A Fire Planning Unit consists of one
or more Fire Management Units. FPUs may relate to a single administrative
unit, a sub-unit, or any combination of units or sub-units. FPUs are
scalable and may be contiguous or non-contiguous. FPUs are not predefined by
agency administrative unit boundaries, and may relate to one or more
agencies. They may be described spatially.
||Fire Resistant as in PPE
||Federal Responsibility Area; the primary financial responsibility for
protecting and suppressing fires is that of the fed govt. These lands are
generally protected by the DOA: FS, the DOI: BLM, NPS, FWS, and BIA
Also, Friction Reducing Agent: Water soluble substance that reduces
frictional drag of solutions and dampens turbulent flow while being pumped
through pipe or hose.
||CAL FIRE’s Fire Resource Assessment Program
||Family Radio Service, a kind of radio
||United States Forest Service, green engines (soon to be white!). See Links page. Also
used to mean Forest Supervisor, a line officer.
||Forest Service Regular (FSR) Type 2 crews are Forest resources but are
considered part of the national mobility concept.
||Federal Supply Schedule or Flight Service Station
||Full Time Equivalents
||Fire Time Report- an individual's record of daily work
||Fouled Up (or Effed Up), Beyond All Recognition, the stage worse than SNAFU;
coined during WWII and used liberally by the troops (even clean-mouthed
troops) as "Fouled Up Beyond All Recognition". In and of itself, not a
||Fire Use Modules, formerly called Prescribed Fire Modules
||Fire Use Management Team, called in to manage a fire that benefits the
environment by burning at low levels.
||(Southwest) Fire Use Training Academy, see Links page under National Wildland Fire
||Fire Use Working Team under guidance from the National Interagency Fuels
Coordination Group (NIFCG)
||Fire Vehicle Standardization Committee, see theysaid 10/9/10
||Federal Wildland Fire Management Plan
||Federal Wildland Fire Service Association.
Congress, led by our intrepid Casey Judd.
||Fire Weather Index: A numerical rating in the Canadian fire danger
rating system, based on meteorological measurements of fire intensity in a
standard fuel type. (The standard fuel type is representative of jack pine
and lodgepole pine.) The FWI is comprised of three fuel moisture codes,
covering classes of forest fuel of different drying rates, and two indices
that represent rate of spread and the amount of available fuel.
||Forestry Weather Information System: real time system which takes
observations and forecasts supplied by NWS in coded numeric form, reformats
that input by computer based algorithms, and distributes the reformatted
information as numeric and worded diagnoses and forecasts for specialized
users in localized areas.
||Fish and Wildlife Service, link: FWS
||Fire Weather Watch
||For Your Information
# ABCDEFG HIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWX
||Geographic Area Coordination Center. Check the links page for a list of GACCs.
In the 1/24/99 post, Ab sez, "If ya don't know what a GACC is, you may be at
the wrong web site."
||Government Accounting Office
||Wildland Fire Skills Gap Courses for Structural Firefighters. See
||Global Fire Monitoring Center (See Links Page under World Wide)
||One of the two major Weather Prediction Models; the other is ECMWF;
don't know what the letters stand for.
||Global Hydrology and Climate Center (See Links Page)
||Graphics Interchange Format. An image file format
||Geographic Information System: Through the process of geocoding,
geographic data from a database is converted into images in the form of
maps; this info presentation is especially helpful on fires for planning and
to keep firefighters from harm. For example a Geographic Information System
Specialist (GISS) supports incident management and can be assigned to an ICS
organization's Situation Unit.
||Geographic Information System Specialist
||Grand Junction Dispatch, fire managers in Grand Junction CO who
demonstrated errors in judgment related to the South Canyon deaths in 1994.
||Gross National Product
||Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite: Server GOES
(Satellite used for data relay from NFDRS weather stations to ASCADS.)
||Good Old Raisins & Peanuts
||A newer version of the King radios the feds seem to use nationally. GPH
is the beginning of the model number. (LPH is the other.)
||Gallons Per Minute
||Global Positioning System: system of navigational satellites operated by
the U.S. Department of Defense and available for civilian use. The system
can track objects anywhere in the world with an accuracy of approximately 40
||Global Positioning System Technical Specialist
||"Group" Retention Incentives from OPM, 1/4/07 theysaid
||General Services Administration who oversees contracting and production of the redesigned
fire shelters, among other things purchased for the fire cache and on national
forests around the country. Also Global Satellite Array, link:
Services occupational classification and ranking
for salary with higher numbers reflecting greater salary
||General Technical Report or Government Transportation Request
||Gum Thickened Sulphate: A dry chemical product which is mixed with water
to form a fire retardant slurry.
||Gross Vehicle Weight: Actual vehicle weight, including chassis, body,
cab, equipment, water, fuel, crew, and all other load. ..as in GVW of crew buggies
that determines the kind of driver's license
required. Discussion starting 02/22/02
||Gross Vehicle Weight Rating: The value specified by the manufacturer as
the maximum allowable weight of a vehicle fully equipped, including payload,
fluids and occupants. Load those crew bodies on then weigh...
# ABCDEFGH IJKLMNOPQRSTUVWX
||Hazard Analysis, see also JHA = Job Hazard Analysis
Management (pdf download)
||Heavy Equipment Mechanic. CDF has two primary classifications for its mechanics: Heavy
Equipment Mechanic (HEM) and the supervisor position of Forestry Equipment Mechanic (FEM).
Both positions are hired off an open list which the public can test for every few years. The
epartment is required to supply a minimum level of fire training for these positions. Monitor
the California State Personnel Board website for
||James Reason's Human Factors Analysis Classification System aka the
Swiss Cheese Model (see Documents Worth Reading, Hugh Carlson's and Misery
||Herger Feinstein/Quincy Library Group
||Hovering in Ground Effect: The situation in which a helicopter is
hovering sufficiently close to the ground to achieve added lift due to the
effects of "ground cushion." The HIGE ceiling, for a given gross weight,
thus is greater than the HOGE (Hovering Out of Ground Effect) ceiling.
||Hovering Out of Ground Effect
||Hazard Pay, 25% over base pay. Can only be obtained on an uncontrolled fire.
||Human Resources/ Officer. FS HR shop was stovepiped in 2005 with much
work left behind on the forests leading to "burden shift". Still have to pay
cost pools on it.
||High Reliability Organization, one that employs Lessons Learned to
become safer: Thanks to one of the original thinkers on this,
Herb Simon, one of the first to look upon organizations as arenas in which
complex organizational processes occur... There are 5 characteristics of
High Reliability Organizations that have been identified (Karl Weick and
Kathleen M. Sutcliffe) as responsible for the "mindfulness" that keeps
them working well when facing unexpected situations.
- Preoccupation with failure
- Reluctance to simplify interpretations
- Sensitivity to operations
- Commitment to resilience
- Deference to expertise
Security Presidential Directive-5 (NIMS)
||Health Screening Questionnaire; must be filled out prior to taking the
WCT (Work Capacity Test or Pack Test)
||handie-talkie, kind of radio
||Hope that helps
||Humboldt-Del Norte Unit of CAL FIRE.
# ABCDEFGHI JKLMNOPQRSTUVWX
||Incident Command System courses
||Initial Attack: A planned response to a wildfire given the wildfire's
potential fire behavior. The objective of initial attack is to stop the fire
and put it out in a manner consistent with firefighter and public safety and
values to be protected.
||Initial attack fire: Fire that is generally contained by the attack
units first dispatched, without a significant augmentation of
reinforcements, within two hours after initial attack, and full control is
expected within the first burning period.
||Initial Attack Dispatcher
||International Association of Fire Fighters; discussion 3/26/09 theysaid
||Initial attack Incident Commander: The incident commander at the time
the first attack forces commence suppression work on a fire.
||Some kind of aviation training, being replaced by ACE (Aviation
conference in Education 2003).
||Incident Action Plan for a fire contains objectives reflecting the
overall incident strategy and specific tactical actions and supporting
info for the next operational period. May be oral or written.
||Interagency Resources Representative, people who track crews on an incident for a GACC;
An individual who may be assigned to or requested by an incident to serve as
the sending unit's representative to oversee the care and treatment of
crews, overhead, and equipment assigned to an incident.
||Interagency Air and Smoke Council
||Interagency Aviation Training
||The International Association of Wildland Fire, a non-profit, professional association
representing members of the global wildland fire community.
||Incident Business Advisor
||Incident Business Practices Working Team, of the NWCG
||Incident Command or Incident Commander (ICT#, with the numbers 1 through 5 being the Types;
For example, a Type 1 team is a national level team, Type 2 team is a regional team, etc.);
also Ignition Component a term of the NFDRS. Inland County Emergency
Services Agency (ICEMA)
||Inland County Emergency Services Agency (in Southern CA)
||Incident Command Post, part of the ICS, the Incident Commander (IC) is located at an Incident
Command Post (ICP) at the incident scene.
Defined as the combination of facilities, equipment, personnel, procedure
and communications operating within a common organizational structure.
||Incident Command System, an on-scene structure of management-level positions suitable for
managing any incident. "A standardized on-scene emergency management concept
specifically designed to allow its users to adopt an integrated
organizational structure equal to the complexity and demands of single or
multiple incidents, without being hindered by jurisdictional boundaries."
||Incident Communications Support Training (See Links Page)
||Incident Command Team, also called Incident Management Team (IMT)
||Inside Diameter, a dimension as of a wheel or a pipe, etc; also
"Interim Directive" is a draft revision of some part of the FS Manual
rules or policies for line officers and FS administrators. It indicates
they're working on a change in policy. Once the policy is finalized, the
"Directive" is added to the FS manual. It is placed in front of the
appropriate chapter to make explicit the change in policy.
||Incident Emergency Plan, discussion on theysaid starting 3/14/09
||Interagency Fire Forecaster Weather Units
||Interagency Fire Program Management has a wildland fire and safety qualifications standards
and guide for 14 identified fire management positions. The New Standards
should be achieved by all by 10/1/09.
||Instrument Flight Rule applies to Conditions / Capabilities
Weather conditions below the minimum for flight under Visual Flight Rules
and therefore requiring the observance of instruments inside the aircraft
for controlling flight; generally considered to be less than 1000' AGL and 3
miles distant. Contrast VFRC (Visual Flight Rules Conditions).
||International Fire Service Training Association
||Interagency Hotshot Crew
||Interagency Helicopter Operations Guide
||International Helicopter Firefighter's Association
||Interagency Initial Attack Assessment (IIAA) model: see
Developing an Interagency, Landscape-scale Fire Planning Analysis and Budget
||Interagency Incident Business Management Handbook.
||Interagency Incident Management Team. Type I and Type II teams from around the United
States that are called in to manage large fires and other kinds of natural and man-made
disasters. See the links page for the Type 1 and Type 2 IIMT links pages.
||Instrument Landing System: System for airplane landing in which the
pilot is guided by radio beams.
||Instrument Meteorological Conditions when flying
||Interactive Multimedia Instruction: Group of predominantly interactive,
electronically delivered training.
||"In my opinion"
||"In my humble opinion", indicates that the writer is aware that they are
expressing a debatable view, probably on a subject already under discussion.
||Interagency Medical Standards Program
||(National) Incident Management Situation Report
Medical Review Board, using the Way Back Machine
||Incident Management Team; the Incident Commander and appropriate general
and command staff personnel assigned to an incident. Also known as Incident
Command Team (ICT).
||Inquiring Minds Want To Know
||Inyo National Forest unit identifier.
||Incident Operation Standards Working Team of the NWCG
||Iron Pipe Thread: tapered thread standard that is used for connecting
various sizes of rigid pipe. This standard may be referred to as tapered
iron pipe thread (TIPT), National pipe thread (NPT), iron pipe thread (IPT),
or iron pipe standard thread (IPS). With tapered thread, the threads and
pipe sealant perform the seal at the connection. This is opposed to straight
thread connectors which use a gasket to form the seal.
||Incident Qualification and Certification System, NWCG, computerized;
replacing the redcard...
||Infra Red; a heat detection system used for fire protection, mapping,
and hotspot identification
||Information Resource Management, also sometimes called ISM or Information
Systems Management. This was the section of the Forest Service that included
the Computer Specialists and Communications Technicians on the forests and
on Incident Management Teams before they were centralized. Don't know if
they still call themselves that. They can no longer serve on incident
management teams as regular team members. Ab.
||Incident Response Pocket Guide
||UN International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (See GFMC and the Links Page under
||Information Technology; FS IT shop was stovepiped in 2005.
||Internet Service Provider
||Interface zone same as Wildland Urban Interface
# ABCDEFGHIJ KLMNOPQRSTUVWX
||Job Aids related courses
||Joint Apprenticeship Committee
||Joint Fire Sciences Program, a six agency partnership to address wildland fuels issues.
The six agencies, designated by the Congress, are the USDA Forest Service and five bureaus
of the Department of the Interior: Bureau of Indian Affairs, Bureau of Land Management,
National Park Service, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and the U.S. Geological Survey.
||Job Hazard Analysis. This is the doc that was recommended in 2005 by Ann
Baker who was Safety Officer for the FS Northern Region
"Job Hazard Analysis Guidelines" 1980 (rtf format)
||Joint Information Center; an interagency information center responsible
for researching, coordinating and disseminating information to the public
and media. Formed through the MAST effort; for example, San Bernardino
Fire Information Center of Southern CA
||Joint Information System: System that integrates incident information
and public affairs into a cohesive organization designed to provide
consistent, coordinated, timely information during crisis or incident
||A method of storing an image in a compressed digital format specified by the Joint
Photographic Experts Group
# ABCDEFGHIJK LMNOPQRSTUVWX
||Keetch-Byram Drought Index with a range from 0 (no moisture deficiency
or complete saturation)
to 800 (maximum drought)
||Keep It Simple Stupid.
||Klamath National Forest unit identifier.
||Sequoia & Kings Canyon National Park unit identifier.
||Knowledge, Skills, Abilities. (Sometimes KASOCs.)
||Kneutson Vandenberg Act led to funds that were legacy funds for the FS
# ABCDEFGHIJKL MNOPQRSTUVWX
||Los Angeles County Fire Department unit identifier.
||Lightning Activity Level, a numerical rating from the lowest of 1 to the highest of 6,
keyed to the start of thunderstorms and the frequency and character of cloud-to-ground
lightning forecasted or observed on a rating area during a rating period, a term of the
NFDRS. The scale is exponential based on powers of 2 (i.e., LAL 3
indicates twice the lightning of LAL 2).
||Laughing My A** Off
||Los Alamos National Lab site of the Cerro Grande Fire of 2000
||Large Air Tanker
||Liquid Concentrate: Liquid phosphate fertilizers used as fire
retardants, usually diluted three to five times prior to application.
||Lookouts, Communication, Escape routes, Safety zones, arose out of a need for
firefighters to be able to quickly recall a fewer number of watchouts than the
original 18 Watch Out Situations. You can find information on these, the Watch
Out Situations, and 10 Standard fire fighting orders at the following web site
||Lookouts, Communication, Escape routes, Evacuation mitigations, Safety zones.
See the AAR on the
Emergency Evacuation Lessons Learned relating to Dutch Creek Mitigation
Measures. theysaid discussion 8/30/10.
||Law Enforcement - generally used to refer to some action going on at the Incident.
||Lead Plane – Light twin-engine airplane that guides air tankers over a
||Law Enforcement Officer (as in FS LEO)
||Large Fire Organization, preceded ICS, See TS discussion 10/13-16/04
Wildland Fire Lessons Learned Center, part of NAFRI. "The LLC promotes a
learning culture to enhance and sustain safe and effective work practices in
the wildland fire community." Great place to study the near misses and
accidents to increase safety awareness.
||Line of Duty Death
||Line Officers' Team - FS
||Land Management Agencies (FS, BLM, NPS, FWS, etc)
||Lassen-Modoc Unit of CAL FIRE
||Lassen National Forest unit identifier
||Lassen Volcanic National Park unit identifier.
||Sonoma-Lake Napa Unit of CAL FIRE.
||Laughing Out Loud
||Los Padres, as in National Forest, Liquid Propane gas, or Lead Plane, depending on context.
||Los Padres National Forest unit identifier
||An older version of the Kings radio than the GPH; it's just the beginning of a serial number
or model number on the radios, all hand-held.
||Local Responsibility Area. These lands are private lands outside of
watershed areas designated by the state, or lands incorporated into cities.
||Land/Resource Management Plan
||Late Successional Reserve, for information: LSR
||Leave WithOut Pay
# ABCDEFGHIJKLM NOPQRSTUVWX
||Multi-Agency Coordination; often from a Coordinating Center, part of the ICS, An activity or a formal
system used to coordinate resources and support between agencies or jurisdictions. A MAC
Group functions within the MACS, which interact with agencies or jurisdictions, not with
incidents. MACS are useful for regional situations. A MACS can be established at a
jurisdictional EOC or at a separate facility.
||Multi-Agency Coordination System is a combination of facilities,
equipment, personnel, procedures, and communications integrated into a
common system with responsibility for coordination of assisting agency
resources and support to agency emergency operations
||Modular Airborne Fire Fighting System is a self-contained reusable 3000-gallon aerial fluid
dispersal system that allows Lockheed C-130 cargo/utility aircraft to be converted to wildland firefighting
air tankers. MAFFS use is a joint program with the Air National Guard,
Air Force Reserve, and the U.S. Forest Service.
||Mountain Area Safety Taskforce (in SoCal)
||Multi-Agency Training Schedule. Links page under education/training.
||March Air Force Base – Brush 10 Fire Engine
||Military Crew Advisor oversees the military crew of firefighters.
||Marine Corps Base
||Modoc National Forest unit identifier.
||Maximum Entry Age for firefighters is 37 so firefighters can accrue their 20 years and
retire with benefits at age 57.
||Historical - Missoula Equipment Development Center, US Forest Service.
Now called the MTDC Missoula Technical and Development Center.
||Most Efficient Level (of funding) for Fire and the Forest Service: The
fire management program budget level that results in the minimum cost plus
net value change.
||Mendocino Unit of CAL FIRE.
||Aviation abbreviation for Minden Air Field, Minden NV.
||Mount Hough Ranger District, a complex of fires on the Plumas NF, mentioned 10/11/99; Giachino's
Northern CA Team was on it 8/24 - 9/13; Frye's Northern Rockies Team was on it 9/9 - 9/22.
[(% Slope) + (% RH) + (Temperature) + (RMP) + (C)] / 3.25
Where variables are defined as:
% Slope = 1-100
% RH = 1-100
Temperature = Degrees Fahrenheit
RMP = Relative Misery of Project, subjectively assessed, 1-5
C = Correction from special charts (0.0 in most cases)
For all temperatures above 0.0 degrees Fahrenheit, the MI produces a
numerical rating on a scale of 1-100. MI's above 50 are considered
significant, 72-78 are considered severe, 78-90 are considered extreme, and
90+ are considered intolerable. An indicator of firefighter morale and thus
firefighter safety. (theysaid 1/5/08)
||Mother I'd Like to <blankety blank> an acronym from the movie American
Pie. This was one example of a poor name
for a fire and would have been especially disastrous if the fire had
gotten to be a big one with media coverage. Small as it was, the name was
changed and that was no easy task. See the fire-naming
discussion starting 06/11/02 for the fire naming pitfalls to be avoided.
||Multiple Incident Response Guide
||A computer program for tracking resources from dispatch to demob on large and small
incidents. The long-term plan is to replace it with ROSS.
||Minimum Impact Suppression Tactics, firefighting tactics used in a wilderness area
||Mobile Kitchen Unit
||Maximum Management Area; MMA refers to a fire with confine/contain
strategy as opposed to just trying to put it out. The MMA fires will be
allowed to move around within the MMA and may change to a full suppression
strategy depending on what becomes threatened. Sometimes these fires do a
lot of good while skunking around.
Also can mean the Master Mutual Aid Agreement (see
||Madera-Mariposa-Merced Unit of CAL FIRE.
||Mendocino National Forest unit identifier.
||Military Operations Area
||Memorandum of Agreement, agreements the federal government makes with other
autonomous entities, such as Tribes
||Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer; is a key instrument
aboard the Terra and Aqua satellites. This instrument provides important
intelligence for fire managers regarding fire perimeters and fire growth
throughout large fires or fire sieges.
||Memorandum of Understanding
||Mutual Response Area
||Meals Rejected by Ethiopians ;) Or for those really wanting to know, a Meal Ready to Eat
||Mean Sea Level or with numbers, above MSL
||Missoula Technical and Development Center (USFS)
||Military Training Route
||Mutual Threat Zone; a geographical area between two or more
jurisdictions into which those agencies would respond on initial attack.
Also called mutual response zone or initial action zone.
||Monte Vista Ranger Unit (San Diego Unit) of CAL FIRE, near San Diego,
# ABCDEFGHIJKLMN OPQRSTUVWX
||National Ambient Air Quality Standards: A legal limit on the level of
atmospheric contamination. The level is established as the concentration
limits needed to protect all of the public against adverse effects on public
health and welfare, with an adequate safety margin.
||National Aerial Firefighting Academy
||National Advanced Fire & Resource
Institute A national level center for strategic planning, development,
and implementation of fire, fuels, resource, and incident management skills
and educational processes. Formerly NARTC
||North American Free Trade Agreement
||National Advanced Resources Technology Center, a multi-agency training
center at Pinal Air Park at Marana AZ (Pronounced Nart-see.)
Specializes in presentation of national-level fire management training
||National Aeronautics and Space Administration,
||National Association of State Foresters
organization comprised of the State Forester from each state and territory
which promotes cooperation in forestry matters between the states and
territories, the federal government and private forestry groups. It promotes
legislation, programs and activities which will advance the practice of
forestry and use of forest products.
||National Aviation and Safety Mishap Prevention Plan
||National Crime Information Center
||Non Destructive Testing of aircraft, especially aging aircraft detects
cracks or any other irregularities in the airframe, structure, landing gear,
and engine components which are not visible to the naked eye.
||A satellite observation-derived value that is sensitive to vegetative
growth, (measured at 1.1 km (0.6 mile) spatial and 1 week temporal scales).
||National Environmental Policy Act of 1969.
||National Environmental Satellite, Data and Information Service: A
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Agency.
||Nevada-Yuba-Placer Unit of CAL FIRE.
||National Forest, for a list of all the national forests, go to
the links page and look under Federal Pages
at the "unit identifiers". Forests of CA are all listed with links to the forests.
For the entire national list including national parks, BLM-administered lands,
county, and city, etc unit identifiers, look at the longer pdf file
available at the top of this page.
||National Fire Academy, see links page under National Wildland Fire Training.
||National Fire Codes: The collected technical fire protection standards
prepared by various committees of the National Fire Protection Association
and published every year in 15 volumes.
||National Fire Danger Rating System, a uniform but multiple index fire
danger rating system that focuses on the environmental factors that control
the moisture content of fuels.
||National Fire Equipment Systems. Overseen by a subcommittee of the Fire Equipment Working
Team that provides for fire equipment distribution in caches around the
US. For example, there are 2 caches of equipment in CA,
in Redding (Anderson) and Ontario.
||National Federation of Federal Employees (AFL-CIO), union for Forest
Service Employees, including wildland firefighters; with AFGE, could be
supplanted by IAFF (primary AFL-CIO firefighter local) under Employee Free
Choice Act; discussion 3/25/09 theysaid
||National Fire Information Reporting System
||National Fire Management Analysis System, the system whereby MEL is calculated.
||National Fire Plan
||National Fire Protection Association: A private, non-profit organization
dedicated to reducing fire hazards and improving fire service; sets safety standards for
protective clothing (PPE) and equipment for wildland firefighting. . The most recent
version is NFPA Specification #1977, the 1998 Edition.
abbreviation for National Fire Protection Agency, a hypothetical wildland
firefighting agency possibly comprised of FS, BLM, NPS, FWS, and BIA. Not
||National Fire Plan Model
||National Standard Thread (National Hose); a defined screw thread used on
fire hose couplings.
||National Historic Preservation Act; what keeps some engine bays or
fire-related structures from being upgraded... or sold to reduce operating
|| National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, Dept of Transportation.
Has issued guidelines regarding 15-passenger vans.
||National Interagency Coordination Center, Boise, Idaho: Coordinates
allocation of resources to one or more coordination centers or major fires
within the nation.
||National Interagency Fire Center, Boise, Idaho (find them here:
www.nifc.gov) is jointly operated by
several federal agencies, dedicated to coordination, logistical support, and
improved weather services in support of fire management operations
throughout the United States.
||National Interagency Fuels Coordination Group
||National Interagency Fire Management Integrated Database: The archive of
daily weather observations from WIMS.
||National Interagency Incident Management System developed by NWCG
developed program consisting of five subsystems which collectively provide a
total systems approach to all-risk incident management. The subsystems are:
The Incident Command System, Training, Qualifications and Certification,
Supporting Technologies, and Publications Management.
||National Interagency Joint Apprenticeship Program for Wildland Fire is
designed to provide standardized and consistent training in a cost effective
manner, provide agencies an opportunity to recruit, hire and develop new
employees quickly, provide apprentices wages commensurate with their skills.
Incident Management Organization
Incident Management System. administered by FEMA which also has
oversight for federal coordination of disaster response/recovery resources
in the US, and is also responsible for administering most of the new
National Response Plan. The new NIMS is based of course on the NIIMS
developed by wildfire, but will be administered not by the agencies and
local governments that have the bulk of the knowledge and experience, but by
a fairly small and understaffed agency (FEMA = tiny recovery oversight
agency with around 1,200 full-time employees) that is not out there dealing
with the largest number of emergencies in the country (fires, wildfires, and
medical aids). See ts, 8/9/04
||National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
||National Interagency Radio Supply Cache
||The NJ Forest Fire Service under the auspices of the New Jersey Dept.
of Environmental Protection.
||National Lightning Detection Network, a lightning detection computer system.
||National Leadership Team. The highest management team -- of the Forest
Service, for example: it is made up of the Chief of the Forest Service, the
Deputy chiefs and the Regional Foresters.
||National MAC or Big MAC; Multiple Agency Coordinating, see MAC above.
||Nitrogen Oxide: product of combustion from transportation and stationary
sources and a major contributor to acid deposition and the formation of
ground level ozone in the troposphere.
||Nitrogen Dioxide: result of nitric oxide combining with oxygen in the
atmosphere. A major component of photochemical smog.
||National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
|North Ops, the Coordination Center for Northern CA (see GACC)
||Notice to Airmen: contains info concerning the establishment, condition,
or change in any component of, or hazard in, the National Airspace System,
info essential to personnel concerned with flight operations.
||National Professional Firefighters it is the membership setting for FWFSA members
who do not have a state association to be affiliated with.
||National Public Radio
||National Park Service
|National Pipe Straight Hose Thread (NPSH) or National Pipe Straight
Mechanical (NPSM) thread: a straight (non-tapered) thread standard with the
same threads per inch as the appropriate size iron pipe thread. It requires
a gasket to seal and is the thread standard used by most U.S. industry.
||Natural Resources, National Registry as in National Registry EMT (see
||National Recreation Area, for example GGNRA, Golden Gate National Recreation
||National Resource Lands: Public lands administered by the Bureau of Land
||National Registry EMT (Emergency Medical Technician) see theysaid
discussion starting 10/19/04
||National Response Plan. FEMA (now the Emergency Preparedness and Response Directorate)
was directed in the Homeland Security Act to compile all of the response plans at the federal
level into one national response plan.
||Northern Rockies Coordination Center (see GACC)
||Navajo Scouts Reserve Fire Fighting Team
|New South Wales Fire Brigade,
Rural Fire Service of Australia.
||Not to Exceed with respect to employment
||National Transportation Safety Board investigates airtanker and helicopter accidents
||Net Value Change
||Night Vision Goggles
||Northwestern Coordination Center (see GACC)
||National Wildfire Coordinating Group, provides standards for a
consistent and defined behavior, action, process, or equipment type, ranging
from prescribed burns,
fire classes, and training at NWCG with info on
quals. NWCG is a group formed under the direction of the Secretaries of the
Interior and Agriculture to improve the coordination and effectiveness of
wildland fire activities and provide a forum to discuss, recommend
appropriate action, or resolve issues and problems of substantive nature.
||National Wildland Fire Engine Committee
||National Weather Service located in Boise ID. See the Links page.
||National Wildfire Suppression Association, a national association of
independent wildfire suppression contractors.
||National Weather Service Forecast Office
||North Zone/ South Zone (Operational Areas of California)
# ABCDEFGHIJKLMNO PQRSTUVWX
||Office of Aircraft Services (See Links Page)
||Organized Crew, the emergency hire crew programs, also could be On Call
||Operations Coordination Center: Primary facility of the Multi-agency
Coordination System (MACS); houses staff and equipment necessary to perform
the MACS function.
||Orange County Fire Authority; OC= Orange County
||Open and continuous recruitment in fire hiring
||Outside Diameter: External diameter of a cylinder or tube, conductor, or
coupling as distinguished from the internal diameter.
||Oregon Department of Forestry. See the Links page.
||Office of Domestic Preparedness, part of the DHS (Dept of Homeland
||Reference an individual forest's Continuity of Operations Plan, 2012
(COOP): Occupant Emergency Plan, a plan for evacuating a facility
during an emergency
||Now CAL EMA, formerly Office of Emergency Services,
||OF 162 form for employment in fire, see post 12/15/98
||OF 510 form for employment in fire, see post 12/15/98
||OF 612 form for employment in fire, see post 12/15/98
||Oregon Fire Contractors Association
||Office of General Council
||Office of Inspector General
||On the job training
for redcard positions. 11/22/99
||OMB provides oversight and offers suggestions on the budget for the
executive branch agencies.
||Oh My Gawd
||Office of Personnel Management,
jobs with the feds
||Operations, North and South OPS, refer to Northern/Southern Geographic Operational
Areas in California
|| Off Road Vehicle: Any motorized vehicle designed for or capable of
cross-country travel on or immediately over land, water, sand, snow, ice,
marsh, swampland, or other terrain. All-Terrain Vehicle
|| Office of Special Counsel or
Operations Section Chief: the ICS position responsible for supervising the
Operations Section. Reports to the Incident Commander. The OSC directs the
preparation of unit operational plans, requests and releases resources,
makes expedient changes to the Incident Action Plan as necessary and reports
such to the IC.
||Operational System Description
||Occupational Safety and Health Administration
(federal), set standards for safety equipment
||Operating Service Life, the estimated life of the structure of an
airtanker based on original structural engineering and missions flown. This
is hard to determine in planes whose designers maintain proprietary secrecy
regarding structure and in planes that flew secret missions during WWII
before being transferred to firefighting service. Not having an estimate of
the OSL has kept many airtankers grounded.
|| The Office of Workers' Compensation Programs of the Department of Labor, provides
process and determines validity of work related claims of accident/injury. Some info
from the National
Association of Letter Carriers.
# ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOP QRSTUVWX
|P to P
||Portal to Portal
||Pain in the A.., a type of "bad" employee who may not advance in their career.
See posts on 11/01/00.
|PA & PAR
||Personnel Accountability. The ability to account for the location and status of personnel.
Personnel Accountability Reports (PAR) . ICS term. Periodic reports verifying the status
of responders assigned to an incident.
||Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons
||Project Activity Level
||Public Affairs Officer
||Precision Approach Radar: Blind landing in which the aircraft is
observed from the ground by means of radar and directed along a suitable
glide path by instructions radioed to the pilot.
||A Paid Call Firefighter
||Federal method of paying bills, if you don't know what it is, you're
||Position Description, each job position has one describing the duties and
||Personal Digital Assistant - little handheld computer/personal
organizer, has date book, address book, task list, memo.
or from familysaid - Public Display of Affection
||Pacific Daylight Time
||Public Employees Retirement System that California State Employees Assoc
(CSEA) members belong to.
||Preliminary Fuels Analysis
||Prescribed Fire Info Reporting System
||Preliminary Fuels Analysis
||Permanent Full Time, as in an employees work status (26/0); see also WAE (18/8 and 13/13).
||National Interagency Rx Fire Training Center, yeah, we know it doesn't make sense,
but that's it; see the links page under wildland fire training.
||Pilot Balloon Operation: A method of determining winds aloft by
periodically reading the elevation and azimuth angles of a theodolite,
usually at one-minute intervals, while tracking the ascent of a small
free-lift balloon. A PIBAL is commonly used for constructing a wind profile.
||Public Information Officer (same as FIO, Fire Info Officer)
||Plumas National Forest unit identifier.
||Pacific Northwest Coordinating Group
||Program Leadership or Preparedness Level
||Professional Liability Insurance: eg.
||Program Leadership Attrition -- a kind of federal funding for fire that will allow
the hiring of 500 people (for each of 3 years 2001-2003).
||Public Management System;
a system used by NWCG for some of their publications
||Probability of Ignition
||Piece of $h*t...
||Prevention of Sexual Harassment, not one of the Spice Girls!
||Privately Owned Vehicle, as opposed to GOV, government owned vehicle.
||Personal liability insurance.
||Personal Protective Equipment to mitigate hazardous firefighting
conditions, including nomex pants and shirt, hardhat, flight helmets,
shroud, goggles, gloves,
loves, respirators, hearing protection, chainsaw chaps, boots, and fire shelter.
||Permanent Part Time
Resources Code (of the State of California) Discussed 06/03 in
relation to CDF airbase and lookout closures.
||Plastic Sphere Dispenser as for aerial ignitions.
Also, Prevention of Significant Deterioration: a program identified
by the Clean Air Act to prevent air quality and visibility degradation and
to remedy existing visibility problems. Areas of the country are grouped
into 3 classes which are allowed certain degrees of pollution depending on
their uses. National Parks and Wilderness Areas meeting certain criteria are
"Class I" or "clean area" in that they have the smallest
allowable increment of degradation.
||Permanent Seasonal Employee (eg, 13/13) For comparison see WAE and PFT.
Check theysaid 4/5/09 for info on employees going from PSE to PFT.
||Pounds per square inch, a measure of pressure
||Public Safety Officer Benefits, the benefits denied to airtanker pilots and
their families if they die in the line of duty.
||Pacific Southwest Research
and Experiment Station
||Position Task Books, they contain all critical tasks which are required to perform
the job. Successful completion of the tasks during OJT is the basis for recommending
redcard certification for that job; it's a document listing the performance
requirements (competencies and behaviors) for a position in a format that
allows for the evaluation of individual (trainee) performance to determine
if an individual is qualified in the position. Successful performance of PTB
tasks, as observed and recorded by a qualified evaluator, will result in a
recommendation to the trainee's home unit that the individual be certified
in the position.
||Post Traumatic Stress, a syndrome that results from a stressful event or
a repeated stressful situation. Symptoms include flashbacks, dwelling on
the event, sleeplessness, being prone to crying.
||Push-to-talk button cover on a handheld radio.
Voluntary Organization (NIMS)
||Project Work Plans
|pyrocumulus (pyroCu) and pyrocumulonimbus (pyroCb); for further
explanation, see this hotlist thread on column building from the vantage
point of space.
||Person Without A Clue
# ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQ RSTUVWX
||Quality Assurance/Quality Control.
Quality Step Increase
and why timing matters, factors to consider, etc. A Quality Step Increase is
a faster than normal within-grade increase used to reward employees at all
General Schedule grade levels who display high quality performance.
# ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQR STUVWX
||Region 1 'Northern Region', including parts of Montana and South Dakota
||Region 2 'Rocky Mountain Region', including parts of Colorado, South Dakota, Wyoming,
||Region 3 'Southwest Region', including parts of Arizona, New Mexico and Oklahoma.
||Region 4 'Intermountain Region' or Great Basin, including parts of Idaho, Utah and
Wyoming & Nevada.
||Region 5 'Pacific Southwest', California, Hawaii, Guam, and other Pacific Islands.
||Region 6 'Pacific Northwest', Oregon and Washington
||Region 8 'Southern Region', including parts of Arkansas, and North and South
||Region 9 'Eastern Region', includes Forests on twenty states.
||Region 10 'Alaska Region', Alaska.
||Rappeller as in heli-rappeller
||Regional Aviation Safety Manager
||Remote Automated Weather System
telemetered weather station that transmits hourly observations 24 times per
day. These observations are automatically delivered through ASCADS to WIMS.
NIFC distributes the info to fire managers nationwide.
||Rest and relaxation
||The Rural Community Fire Protection Program, now called the VFA.
||Required day off
||Reconnaissance. To examine a fire area to obtain information about
current and probable fire behavior and other related fire suppression
||Remote Environmental Monitoring System.
||Rural Fire District. An organization established to provide fire
protection to a designated geographic area outside of areas under municipal
fire protection. Usually has some taxing authority and officials may be
appointed or elected.
||Rural Fire Protection District, see also VFD
||Rear Eschalon Mother blankity blank, a military term; the overhead not on the
ground (who may never have been on the ground)
||Request for Quotation as for an Engine Tender, supplies the the list of contract specs.,
engine inventory lists, performance standards, training standards, engine inspection sheets,
and lists of contacts around the region to get inspected as a contractor.
||Red Flag Warning
||Relative Greenness: An NDVI-derived image of vegetation greenness
compared to how green it has been historically.
||Relative Humidity: The ratio of the amount of moisture in the air, to
the maximum amount of moisture that air would contain if it were saturated.
The ratio of the actual vapor pressure to the saturated vapor pressure.
||Regional Hotshot Crew, type 1
||Regional Leadership Team. The highest management team of the Forest
Service for a Region.
||Risk Management: A continuous, five-step process that provides a
systematic method for identifying and managing the risks associated with any
||Rocky Mountain Research Station
||Redwood National Park unit identifier.
||a Report on Conditions sent by Cal Fire ECC's to SOPS or NOPS for
|Rolling On the Floor,
Laughing My A$$ Off!
||Remain overnight; often used in terms of the point where a coyote crew
stops at the end of shift and camps out to resume work in the morning
Program, a vocational training program operated at
the state and county level. There are often good training opportunities
for wildland firefighters, at least in CA.
||Rate of Spread, as in fire behavior
||Resource Ordering and Status System, a computer program used by
dispatch. A national system that provides automated support to interagency
and agency dispatch and coordination offices. The system will provide
current status of resources available to support all-risk activities; enable
dispatch offices to exchange and track resource ordering information
electronically; enable dispatch offices to rapidly and reliably exchange
mission-critical emergency electronic messages.
||Recognition Primed Decisionmaking. Simply put, RPD is what behavioral
scientists say is at the root of how incident commanders make decisions in
the complex wildland fire environment. You compare your present situation to
a similar situation or situations that you have experienced previously, then
make your decision based on your memory of the outcome(s) of the previous
experience(s). From theysaid 12/13/04
Misery Whip's post
||Reduction in Force
||Regional Leadership Forum, R5 Line Officers and Directors (Forest Rangers and
||Rocky Mountain Coordination Center (see GACC)
||Rocky Mountain Research Center
||Redwood National Park unit identifier.
||Riverside Unit of CAL FIRE.
||RTO has been used in hotshot crews and means "reverse tool order" or
"reverse the order". All it means is turn around and head back, give me
a count and I will give you instructions after the count. It is what some call the
"eject button" for a hand crew.
||Rapid Update Cycle, a
NOAA/ NCEP operational weather prediction system
|RX or Rx
||Prescribed, as in burn
# ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRS TUVWX
||The S or skills class series in fire behavior. See the note at the end of this list on
course prefixes and/or go to the NWCG training website.
||Survey and Manage (Species)
||Southern Area Coordination Center (see GACC)
|| Safety Accident Investigation Team:
From AAR to SAI
||Situational Awareness, or mindfulness (opposite of mindlessness,
being on "autopilot"); what is happening here and now. Ab's best try at a
definition: A non-intuitive sensory adaptation of "paying attention" or seeing
more clearly what the moment holds. Maintaining a moment-by-moment,
dynamically-changing awareness of your (fire) environment and you in it. Focusing your
awareness on what you see and what you feel NOW, how does that compare to what you
have seen-felt before? how is that different from what you have seen-felt
before? Stripping away stereotype and being aware of the possible question based on reason
and gut feeling: If it looks ok, why does it not feel ok? Stepping outside of what
everyone else might think is true or what you might "assume" to be true to
look at possible uncertain, possible unpleasant alternative explanations.
It's not thinking harder, but seeing more clearly the truth of the moment.
||Safety Communiqué for aviation:
SAFECOM same as SAFENET but for aviation.
||Safety Communiqué for ground forces:
SAFENET is a form and process, used by wildland firefighting agencies,
for reporting and resolving incidents relating to firefighter safety. The
information collected is used to determine long-term trends and problem
areas within the wildland fire industry.
||Serious Accident Investigation, with the intent of preventing future
accidents and defending the organization from litigation; involves both a
factual section (identifying chronologically the causal and contributing
factors that led to the accident) and a management evaluation section; an
administrative review for investigative purposes. Witness statements are
taken. Can result in 1) individual consequences if there was "reckless and
willful disregard for human safety" and/or 2) agency policy change. Contrast
with APA (Accident Prevention Analysis).
Hierarchy of Analysis/Investigation for a Learning Organization: AAR --> FLA
--> APA --> SAI
||Serious Accident Investigation Team
||Search and Rescue; except when talking about ICS (or CICS) history it
meant Suppression and Rescue
||Santa Barbara County Fire Department unit identifier.
||Santa Barbara Dispatch Center unit identifier.
||Spread Component a term of the NFDRS.
||Self Contained Breathing Apparatus, primarily used in structure
firefighting but increasingly available on the wildland-urban interface.
||Aviation abbreviation for Sacramento Air Field, Sacramento CA.
||Santa Clara Unit of CAL FIRE.
Development Organizations (NIMS)
||San Dimas Technology and Development Center, located in SoCal near LA.
||Single Engine Air Tanker
||Reference an individual forest's Continuity of Operations Plan, 2012
(COOP): Significant Events Response Team, A team which helps
government agencies establish communication command centers. The regional
COOP plan will have contact information.
||Senior Executive Service
||US Government application for employment
||State Fire Assistance. In western states,
NFP State Fire Assistance (SFA) funding -- for example
for the PNW
-- is available and awarded
“through a competitive process with emphasis on hazard fuel reduction,
information and education, and community and homeowner action”
||Sergeant First Class
||Standard Firefighting Orders, 10 of 'em.
||Shasta-Trinity National Forest unit identifier
||Shasta-Trinity Unit of CAL FIRE.
||Siskiyou Unit of CAL FIRE.
||Safety and Health Working Team, of the NWCG
||State Implementation Plan
||Interagency Management Situation Report summarizes statistics on the
fires burning across the United States by individual fire, region, for both
prescribed burns and wildfires and reports resources that are committed on
||Unofficial abbreviation used by posters for Salt Lake City UT
||Staffing Level with respect to fire management ranges from 1-5, a term of the NFDRS.
||San Louis Obispo Unit of CAL FIRE.
||Survey and Manage (species)
||Situation Normal, All F..ed Up, military term that is now in common parlance
||Shasta-Trinity National Forest unit identifier.
||Sierra Nevada Framework
||Supervisor's Office or Safety Officer -- or if you're reading
familysaid, Significant Other;
||Second Order Fire Effects: The secondary effects of fire such as tree
regeneration, plant succession, and changes in site productivity. Although
second order fire effects are dependent, in part, on first order fire
effects, they also involve interaction with many other non-fire variables.
||Son of a B**
||Standard Operating Guideline
||Sh** Outta Luck
||Standard Operating Procedure
|South Ops, the Coordination Center for Southern CA (see GACC)
||State Personnel Board, as in CA SPB, which has a website that contains open list
information and includes testing dates for primary and secondary state fire jobs such
as FEM and HEM for which the public can test every few years.
||Sequoia National Forest unit identifier.
||Single Resource in contrast to Strike Team..
||State Resource Area, in California, the area under the jurisdiction of
the state -CDF Fire- as opposed to the Feds or the County.
||Slang for Single Resource Boss; for the correct redcard acronym, see the
redcard mnemonics link at the top of the page.
||Six Rivers National Forest unit identifier.
||Smoke-Sensitive Area: Area where smoke from outside sources is
intolerable, for reasons such as heavy population, existing air pollution,
or intensive recreation or tourist use.
||State (kind of crew designation); or Strike Team, for example an engine
Strike Team consists of 5 fire engines of the same type and a lead vehicle.
The strike team leader is usually a captain or a battalion chief. Strike
teams can also be made up of bulldozers or handcrews. (Often in contrast to
SR or single resource.)
||Sand Table Exercises, a form of training groups of people, for example
hotshots use STEX
to work on developing their tactical knowledge in the face of developing scenarios
||Stanislaus National Forest unit identifier.
||Short Takeoff and Landing, often refers to a smokejumper aircraft such
as a Twin Otter.
||(Fire) STOP, or Standard Type One Program, a kind of helicopter program (see
Sting's 3/18/01 post)
||Static Water Supply, the designation of pools, spas and other sources of water
for fighting fire used in Australia. For a description see Aussie CFU's post of 5/15/02.
||Strike team leader, sometimes the D is included. For the correct
redcard acronym, see the redcard mnemonics link at the top of the page.
||Southwest Coordination Center (see GACC)
Sierra Wildland Fire Reporting System
||South West Fire Fighters
# ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRST UVWX
||Threatened and Endangered (Species)
||Tactical channels, several frequencies which are generally pretty close to
each other, but seperate; our forest uses 168.200 and there are more, I think,
generally running in variances of .100 or so mhz.
||Tactical Aviation Research Management
||Tuolumne-Calaveras Unit of CAL FIRE.
||Threatened and Endangered Species
||Task Force Leader. For the correct redcard acronym, see the
redcard mnemonics link at the top of the page.
||Technical Fire Management, see links page under National Wildland Fire Training.
||Temporary Flight Restrictions occur in the airspace above wildland fires and when
the President flies in to visit a fire. It reduces air traffic to essential
||Texas Forest Service, the Texas equivalent of the DNR or the Dept of Forestry, other
state forestry organizations that have a fire component.
See the Links Page for this and other state fire organizations.
||Tehama Glenn Unit of CAL FIRE.
||Tender Loving Care
||Travel Management Center
||Lake Tahoe Basin Management Unit, managed by FS FAM in R5; the Fire
Management Officer (FMO) who manages the TMU is part of the R5 Board of
Directors (BOD). In California most fire management "Units" are under
CalFire jurisdiction, except for this one, which is fed managed.
||Transfer of Station, as in moving to a new "duty station"
part-and-parcel of accepting a new job.
||The Nature Conservancy, a non-governmental organization or NGO
||Tahoe National Forest unit identifier.
||Thermal Protective Performance, a rating for PPE
||Teddy Roosevelt, not a standard acronym!
||Tahoe Regional Planning Agency, mentioned following the Angora Fire '07.
||Timber Stand Improvement
||Ta Ta For Now
||Tank Truck Operator, old nomenclature for FEO, now called Engineers, all are assistant
foremen on an engine.
||Tulare Unit of CAL FIRE.
||Training Working Team of the NWCG
# ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTU VWX
||Unified Area Command or Area Command, part of the ICS, established as necessary to provide
command authority and coordination for two or more incidents in close proximity.
Area Command works directly with Incident Commanders. Area Command becomes
Unified Area Command when incidents are multijurisdictional. Area Command may be
established at an EOC facility or at a location other than an ICP.
||Unmanned Aerial Vehicle, aerial "drone", possible new technology for
||Unified Command, an application of the ICS used when there is more than one agency
with incident jurisdiction. Agencies work together through their designated Incident Commanders
at a single ICP to establish a common set of objectives and strategies, and a single Incident
||Ultra High Frequency: Radio frequencies from 300 Megahertz (MHz) to
3,000 MHz with a normal range of less than 50 miles. Radio frequency common
to military aircraft and used in the logistics radio system. The most common
frequencies used by fire and public safety are from 406 MHz to 512 MHz.
||Urban Interface, refers to the wildland/urban interface; alternatively,
||Uniform Resource Locator. The address to a source of information on the Internet.
The URL contains four distinct parts, the protocol type, the machine name, the directory
path and the file name. For example: http://www.webhead. gen.nz/index.htm.
||Unable to locate
|Urban Search and Rescue (FEMA)
||United States Department of Agriculture
||United States Fire Administration
||United States Forest Service, "green engines", Department of Agriculture.
||Unable to Fill, as in resource order requests for large fire support.
||Unexploded ordinance; most likely on military bases.
# ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUV WX
Fire Assistance Program, formerly known as the Rural Community
Fire Protection (RCFP) Program, can provide Federal financial, technical, and other
assistance to State Foresters and other appropriate officials to organize, train and
equip fire departments in rural areas and rural communities to prevent and
suppress fires. A rural community is defined as having 10,000 or less population.
||Volunteer fire department in which some or all members are unpaid.
||Visual Flight Rules Conditions: Basic weather conditions prescribed for
flight under Visual Flight Rules: ceiling above 1,000 feet (300 m) and
flight visibility in excess of 3 miles (5 km).
||Veterans of Foreign Wars
||Very High, as in fire danger rating or radio frequency VHF-AM for ex.
||Volunteers in Prevention, CDF volunteers called in to help in emergency situations. Also
"very important person."
||Very Large Air Tanker
||Vegetation Management Program for reducing flammable vegetation.
LACounty has an aggressive program of fuel reduction on the interface.
||Ventura County Fire Department unit identifier.
||Volcanic Fog - sometimes used for hot gasses (steam, etc) escaping volcanoes, but most
often used for the "steam" when lava flows hit water. VOG
contains toxic chemicals. Watch out for it when fighting fires in Hawaii,
||VHF Omnidirectional Radio Range: System of radio navigation in which any
magnetic bearing relative to a special radio transmitter on the ground may
be chosen and flown by an aircraft pilot.
# ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVW X
||When Actually Employed: Technically the term should not
be used anymore since our FS appointments specify some number of guaranteed pay
periods, ie, 18/8 or 13/13 (eg, 18 on and 8 off). However, often we still use it
to mean a tour other than PFT (Permanent Full Time, 26/0). With WAE the employee has
their permanent status (Career or Career Conditional) and gets benefits, but works less
than year round. Example: WAE 13/13 means actually employed for half the pay periods possible.
||Working Capital Fund, fund code
Work Capacity Test
||Wilderness EMT or wilderness emergency medical responder
||Wildland Fire Assessment System
Decision Support System
Wildland Firefighter Foundation
||Wildland Fire Hazardous Fuels, a fund code (other fund codes: WFPR
||Wildland Fire Implementation Plan, a progressively developed assessment
and operational management plan that documents the analysis and selection
of strategies and describes the appropriate management response for a
wildland fire being managed for resource benefits.
||Wildland Fire Leadership Council.
||Wildland Fire Preparedness Resources or Wildland Fire Pre-suppression
Fund, a fund code; Appropriated Funds, theoretically, not used for other
purposes without approval of the chief. This was frequently disregarded in
2006 by Line Officers on forests. The two current fire planning models
(NFMAS and FPA) both show that dollars spent for preparedness (planned need)
significantly reduce the losses from unplanned fire events.
||Women in the Fire Service and camp for
young women Camp Blaze
||Wildland Fire Situation Analysis is a decision-making process that
evaluates alternative suppression strategies against selected
environmental, social, political and economic criteria. Provides a record
||Wildland Fire Suppression and Severity, a fund code (unplanned need); The two current fire planning
models (NFMAS and FPA) both show that dollars spent for preparedness
(planned need) significantly reduce the losses from unplanned fire events.
||Wildland Fire Training Center in Sacramento CA
||Wildland Fire Use; sometimes a Fire Use Management Team is called in if the best use
is to let the fire burn to enhance the environment. See also WFRUB, the same
||Wildland Fire Use for Resource Benefit. Biker Joe said it might
otherwise be called "prescribed natural fire". See WFIP.
||Western Great Basin Coordination Center (see GACC)
||Weather Information Management System
||or WLF.com, acronym for wildlandfire.com
||Weapons of Mass Destruction
||Workforce Reduction and Placement System
||Western Regional Climate Center
||Wilderness Study Area
||Wildland Urban Interface (Pronounced Woo-ee.) The line, area or zone
where structures and other human development meet or intermingle with
undeveloped wildland or vegetative fuel.
||Yosemite National Park unit identifier
Zooming User Interface, (Pronounced Zoo-ee) a kind of graphical
interface that lets the user zoom in, as on Google Earth and Google Maps.
Course prefixes the S course stands for skills,
the I course stands for the ICS-related courses, D for dispatch, RX for
prescribed fire, and J for Job Aids courses. See NWCG's certification and training regulations at NWCG
Qualification Documents (PMS 310-1)
Starter, Repeater, and Tactical preceded by four numbers – all
refer to portable radio kits.
Type - 1, 2, 2-IA, and 3 – Various resources are “typed” and
refers to the capability or configuration of the resource.