Ridge Fire, Idaho – Kyle S. Ford: Wildland Fire Photographer
As part of my day job I am assigned to a type 2 IMT (Incident Management Team). We were assigned to the Ridge fire on July 18th and took over the fire on the 19th. We were on the incident for a full 14 days. I finally got home yesterday August 3rd, It was amazing to sleep in my own bed. I primarily do GIS for the team but I can’t go anywhere without my cameras. The team utilized my photographic abilities for some fire behavior photos and various other crew photos.
The fire was located near Red Mtn and we set up our Incident Command Post (ICP) on the Warm Springs Creek Airport, which wasn’t more than a grassy airstrip. This was somewhere between Lowman and Stanley Idaho. The fire was almost completely inaccessible, except via helicopter. Because of this reason we had a heavy air presence almost the entire assignment. We had an Air Attack to oversee all air operations over the fire, two Type 1 (helitankers), two type 2, and four type 3 helicopters. Living in Nevada I don’t get to see this kind of timber and rivers very often. It was absolutely gorgeous there.
A lot of other photos on my instagram : https://KyleSFord.com/instagram
Ridge Fire ICP from the Air.
ICP at 0545, just before the 0600 briefing.
Sun and moon rise from ICP
The type 1 helitanker 749 “Marty”.
Sling load operations.
Crews coming off the Ridge Fire.
Crew shuttle up to the fire.
ENA crew briefing with Dave, one of the Operation Section Chiefs.
Launching a weather balloon.
View from the cockpit.
Fire behavior from the air.
Sara dressed up as Brandon for one of our morning briefings.
Our awesome camp crew that kept our camp fully stocked and clean.
One of the incident action plan maps I created for the fire.
