A Drone Lights a Prescribed Fire at Homestead National Historical Park

Researchers from the University of Nebraska–Lincoln launch an uncrewed aircraft carrying a plastic sphere dispenser to set interior ignitions on a prescribed fire at Homestead National Historical Park. Credit: National Park Service / Mike Johnson.

On April 22, 2016, Homestead National Historical Park in Nebraska carried out the first prescribed fire in the National Park Service to use a small uncrewed aircraft system (UAS) for interior ignition. Working with the University of Nebraska–Lincoln (UNL), the park burned twenty-six acres of restored tallgrass prairie, meeting its management goals.

The aircraft

The UAS came from UNL's Nebraska Intelligent Mobile Unmanned Systems (NIMBUS) Laboratory. It is a much smaller version of the aerial ignition devices carried by crewed helicopters. A multidisciplinary UNL team, with expertise in micro-UAS technology, fire ecology, conservation and public policy, is developing it to support prescribed fire and wildland firefighting.

"UAS's in firefighting have the potential to reduce direct risk to firefighters doing ignition work while reducing costs and making an aerial resource more widely accessible to wildland firefighting efforts," said Jim Traub, the Park Service's uncrewed aircraft system specialist. "The National Park Service was pleased to facilitate this unique and innovative opportunity with UNL, for this test of an sUAS in a fire situation."

A test years in the planning

The park, the Park Service's Midwest Region Fire and Aviation Program and its National Aviation Offices worked with the NIMBUS Laboratory and the Department of the Interior's Office of Aviation Services on this operational test of bringing small UAS into wildland fire operations. It followed the intent of a 2015 UAS technology overview approved by Cam Sholly, then the Park Service's associate director for visitor and resource protection; Kim Thorsen, the Interior Department's deputy assistant secretary; Mark Bathrick, director of the Office of Aviation Services; and other agencies based at the National Interagency Fire Center.

Scott Beacham of the Park Service's Midwest Regional Office briefs crews and media before ignition. Credit: National Park Service / Mike Johnson.

Burn day

The right weather came on April 22. Firefighters from Homestead, the Midwest Regional Office, the Black Hills Wildland Fire Module, Wind Cave National Park, the Bureau of Indian Affairs' Horton Agency, and the Beatrice and Fairbury rural fire departments took part, and a fire ecologist from the Park Service's Heartland Inventory and Monitoring Program gave weather updates throughout. Crews lit and held the east and west flanks of the burn area, giving the NIMBUS team time to test the aircraft on the interior ignition.

The UNL researchers judged the test a success. Their lead researcher, Sebastian Elbaum, said the aircraft had worked very well, that the things they set out to verify had been verified, and that the team came away understanding better how the technology could be improved.

Sources

Based on "Small Uncrewed Aircraft Used for Prescribed Fire at Homestead National Historical Park," published by the National Park Service, Homestead National Historical Park; rewritten in hubnx's own words.

• Words on this page from people and organisations outside the federal government are paraphrased; rewritten in hubnx's own words.