Demonstrated Successes in 2021 for South Florida’s Exclusive Use Contract Helicopter

Aerial ignition operations by the Exclusive Use helicopter.

NPS/M GUE

South Florida Fire and Aviation (SFFA) has one of the largest and most active aviation programs within the National Park Service (NPS). In FY2021 the program shifted from using DOI fleet helicopters to using an Exclusive Use Contract. This change provided many benefits to the aviation program and the South Florida National Parks and Preserve Fire and Aviation Management Division.

FY2021 Program at a Glance

• Flew 143.1 hours across 143 days on contract
• Supported nine prescribed fires for 26 days on those operations
• Supported prescribed fire operations resulting in the treatment of 70,250 acres
• Responded to 15 wildfires for 43 days on those incidents
• Deployed 32,057 PSD balls across >14 days of PSD operations
• Responded to two interagency resource orders and one interagency Memorandum of Understanding assist
• 0 days aircraft unavailable
• $440,588.95 total cost of contract, 143 days availability cost $243,100.00 or $1700.00 a day

In February 2021, SFFA transitioned from reliance on Everglades N626 and Big Cypress N206RW, two local DOI fleet type 3 helicopters, to one Exclusive Use (EU) Contract helicopter while continuing to operate N206RW, one of the DOI fleet aircraft. Acquisition of this EU helicopter brought substantial improvement through its ability to perform fire suppression and prescribed fire missions. Not only was this EU helicopter more technically capable than previous NPS fleet aircraft, but availability of onsite mechanics/maintenance resulted in almost no downtime for routine maintenance and repairs, where similar issues had previously resulted in long periods of downtime for fleet aircraft. SFFA’s previous reliance solely on two DOI fleet helicopters resulted in the program experiencing several periods of downtime due to maintenance and repair issues which necessitated heavy reliance on more costly On-Call/Call When Needed aircraft. The shift to maintaining only one fleet rotor wing resulted in substantial savings for the program and acquisition of the EU helicopter provided a more cost-effective solution to previous fleet aircraft issues.

The results are favorable when comparing the SFFA FY21 EU program to similar NPS programs using the most recent FY20 numbers from the National Aviation Office. Numbers show the $440,588.95 total cost of the SFFA contract was 29.5% lower than the NPS average of $622,952, yet it was on contract 15 more days. The SFFA EU helicopter flew the same average number of fires and total flight hours but flew 46% more fire flight hours than average, with a 64.5% lower than average cost per fire flight hour, and with the cost per fire 44% lower than average.

With the EU helicopter based in Everglades National Park (EVER) and the fleet helicopter N206RW at Big Cypress National Preserve (BICY), both SFFA aircraft were able to seamlessly transition between operations within EVER and BICY. SFFA’s ability to utilize both aircraft, working in tandem, greatly improved wildfire response within SFFA’s area of operation and significantly enhanced the program’s ability to identify, locate and contain all local unwanted wildfires quickly and efficiently.