Firefighters who put out blazes from the air across the Southwest will be able to do their jobs more efficiently during the busy 2024 fire season thanks to upgrades at Kirtland Air Force Base.
The U.S. Forest Service hosted a ribbon-cutting ceremony May 17 for recently completed upgrades to the Cibola National Forest and National Grasslands Albuquerque Air Tanker Base (ATB) located at Kirtland.
According to a Forest Service press release, the upgrade will allow Very Large Air Tankers (VLATs) to be filled with fire retardant at the Albuquerque location. The aircraft will travel to help put out fires at locations across the state and in Arizona, California, Colorado, Louisiana and Texas. There are only four facilities in the U.S. capable of filling the tankers, and the ATB is operational year-round.
As the size and severity of wildfires continue to evolve, the Forest Service must keep up with the demand for aid with larger aircraft capable of transporting larger payloads. Very large air tankers hold 9,400 gallons of fire retardant compared to large air tankers with a 3,000 to 4,000-gallon capacity.
The ATB contains multiple fire-retardant tanks able to hold 25,000 gallons each. The press release said that having full-time access to 75,000 gallons of fire retardant will “greatly increase” the speed at which firefighters can combat wildfires in the Southwestern, Rocky Mountain, Intermountain and Southern Regions. The ATB is one of only two bases in the country capable of filling two VLATs at the same time.
Up to 30 employees work at the ATB during firefighting operations, including contractors and pilots.
Local firefighters have already had their hands full in 2024. Fire season is in full swing, and both Moriarty and Torrance County firefighters welcome all the help they can get. Like the emergency responders in Torrance County, many rural fire departments across New Mexico already rely heavily on volunteers to assist understaffed teams, and one of the goals of the ATB upgrade is to improve the capabilities of the air tankers and lighten the departments’ workloads.
When the tankers are not being used to fight fires, they may also be used to observe wildlife populations and conduct surveys of forest health.