Last year, 90,674 wildfires marked the worst U.S. fire season in recorded history. Chiefs who believe wildland fires don't apply to their departments may need to check again. The wildland/urban interface increasingly brings structural fire departments face-to-face with wildland challenges. Never before has the line between “outdoors” and “next door” been so blurry.

With that in mind, Fire Chief correspondent Timothy Elliott spoke with Neal Hitchcock, manager of the National Interagency Coordination Center at the National Interagency Fire Center. Read on. After all, you never know when you might need to ask him for air support.

FC: “National Interagency Fire Center” suggests a war room or incident command center from which fires are fought, but it's really more of a support agency for the fire crews on the ground, isn't it?

Hitchcock: Our role is not command and control, as you would have at a local command center. nifc is not a single agency; it's a facility in Boise, Idaho, that brings together five federal agencies with land management responsibilities: Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management, Park Service, Fish and Wildlife Service, and Bureau of Indian Affairs.

The operational aspects of our fire management mission are coordinated out of this facility. The office I work for provides logistical support for fires and other emergencies around the country and internationally. Our role is a lot like a dispatch function.

FC: What kinds of resources does your office track?

Hitchcock: For us, it's the number of hotshots, and there will be about 87 of those this year. [Last year there were 68 hotshot crews with a total of 1,360 firefighters nationwide.] We also track jumpers [there are about 400 smokejumpers], the heavy airtankers [there are 41], and kitchen and shower contractors [45 or so companies], among others. Those resources are limited and critical, so we want to make sure they're allocated to the highest priority.

FC: Most fire chiefs interact with federal agencies only during terrorism-preparedness exercises or emergencies such as the Oklahoma City bombing. How do you keep everybody working together?

Hitchcock: The big difference between our operation and the analogy you drew is between law enforcement and fire. Sometimes their missions are different, and that can cause a rub. The agencies here are united by a common mission: fire management. We've agreed to common standards in terms of operating systems, training and protocols, how we agree to do business. That enables us to work together hand-in-glove, regardless of whose jurisdiction a fire may be in.

FC: In 1999, there was a dramatic increase in the number of firefighter line-of-duty deaths associated with wildland or grass fires, 18 to be exact. There were 13 deaths associated with wildland fires last year. What effect have those deaths had on your operation?

Hitchcock: Any time we have a period of accidents, it draws a lot of attention. The Mann Gulch Fire in 1949 [which overran 16 smoke jumpers in Montana, killing 13 of them] resulted in a number of policy changes and new techniques. Same thing in 1994, when we had the Storm King Fire in Colorado [during which 14 wildland firefighters died]. These incidents demand reviews of policies, practices and operational procedures. In fact, we just revisited all the action items from 1994. Anytime we do have accidents, we work to make sure we don't have to repeat them.

FC: What did the review turn up now six years down the line? Had most of the recommendations been implemented?

Hitchcock: We have a report on the nifc Web site that details the review [www.nifc.gov/fire_policy/index.htm]. The executive summary is a good place to start. In general, the feeling was that certain course corrections were made at the time and new practices implemented. There were a number of items [raised] last year in terms of urban interface that were brought up in 1994. Essentially, the fire hazard in many areas is worse than we previously understood.

FC: You had an extraordinary season last year. There are facts and figures on the nifc Web site, but maybe you can help us put them into terms that people can visualize.

Hitchcock: For us, last summer was an intense period. The volume of work was significant. The challenge was quite big, because we had a lot of fire and a lot of places that were at risk. You add the complexity of the election year and lots of attention on every move we made; it made it quite interesting.

Last year we noticed a degradation of skills in our organizations. Our work force is aging and we hadn't been hiring in a lot of new positions because of our budget situations, so we were short on the intermediate-level supervisor positions. As we got this record number of fires going, and problems in Idaho and Montana especially, we needed people to help us direct field operations.

We brought down trained professionals from the Canadian forestry agencies to help manage incidents and provide that crew-level or strike-team leader supervision. We also had firefighters with the same kind of skill base from Australia and New Zealand. That was a first for us, to reach that far away.

FC: Any predictions for this year's fire season? It seems to be shaping up as another bad one.

Hitchcock: It's too early to tell. I'll give you a good prediction next November.