PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) — There are good reasons why there isn’t more air support fighting the wildfires currently ravaging Oregon.
Six Oregon Air National Guard Chinook helicopters are currently deployed overseas on a combat mission to carry cargo and equipment to resupply areas around Afghanistan.
There are 7 other National Guard helicopters currently in use against the wildfires: 4 doing water drops, 2 for search-and-rescue and one for fire mapping.
But fire officials said it’s the conditions that prevent them from flying.
“The high winds really puts aircraft on the ground,” said Doug Grafe, the Chief of Fire Protection at the Oregon Department of Forestry. “So the inability to fly under these conditions and now we’ll be facing with the smoke conditions we also can see the fires under these inversions as the smoke settles in.”
Grafe said because of the pandemic, the US Forest Service invested in the extra choppers this year.
“We’ve had access as needed to aircraft, in large part also because we invested in 36 additional helicoptes at the beginning of this fire season. That’s been a tremendous asset for us to date,” he said.
The Oregon National Guard said they will reach out to other states through mutual aid agreements to bring in more help as needed.
