Would the ARFF index of an airport ever affect a flights legality to be dispatched? By this I mean lets say that its a small regional airport that has Index A ARFF with one truck. For the situation, the truck gets called to respond to assist another fire department in a fire off airport property. Since the only ARFF truck is off property and therefore unavailable, would that nullify its ARFF Index temporarily. Since you would have no notice of the fire and therefore no notice of ARFF assets being unavailable would the flight still be able to be dispatched? Also if the ARFF index of an airport is ever affected long terms like maybe maintenance of the trucks or some other issue, would a NOTAM put out by the airport operator?
Airport ARFF Index
- Thread starter A1TAPE
- Start date
flyingmedic
Well-Known Member
Response of the year....lol
flyingmedic
Well-Known Member
Heh. You forget what it’s like to be the FNG eh?
Negative
thegriffinpages
AKA "Icicles"
Lol. Well, I thought it was a good question!
Squirrel
Well-Known Member
Your answer is you can dispatch to a airport with a degraded arff 1 below your aircraft rating so cat c can be dispatched to cat b. Think there is a caveat that you can't do it to the same airport more than 3 times a month. But I'm to lazy to look it up.
If you are chance studying for your practical don't worry about that stuff not taught. You will learn on it on the job.
No one is ever fully prepared for their first job. Can not teach everything or you would never get out of class.
If you are chance studying for your practical don't worry about that stuff not taught. You will learn on it on the job.
No one is ever fully prepared for their first job. Can not teach everything or you would never get out of class.
F
Flying Saluki
Guest
I've never heard of this. Can you provide a reference?
who'swho
Don't hesitate. Penetrate!
Can't think of the reference right now but you can dispatch to an airport that is 1 ARFF category lower than what the aircraft is rated as long you don't have more than 5 scheduled into that airport per day (could be 3 scheduled per day, I'd have to find the FAR again).
who'swho
Don't hesitate. Penetrate!
MAK49
Well-Known Member
I have never, ever heard of ARFF equipment leaving the airport to fight a fire somewhere else. Like most people have said, if equipment is out, it will be NOTAMed.
Since I have experience as a firefighter (not ARFF, but have responded to aircraft crashes before)...most decent fire departments will have the resources they need to put out an aircraft fire off an airport, which means you won't have a need to have ARFF respond from an airport. The department I was on, besides the water the trucks have, there is a system called CAFS (Compressed Air Foam System), so we were able to lay foam as well if needed. Sadly, all the crashes I was ever on were fatal accidents though.
Since I have experience as a firefighter (not ARFF, but have responded to aircraft crashes before)...most decent fire departments will have the resources they need to put out an aircraft fire off an airport, which means you won't have a need to have ARFF respond from an airport. The department I was on, besides the water the trucks have, there is a system called CAFS (Compressed Air Foam System), so we were able to lay foam as well if needed. Sadly, all the crashes I was ever on were fatal accidents though.
They can and they have, many times responded off airport, when ARFF capability is required for an off airport accident, or to assist for other fire department mutual aid that requires ARFF capability. Has occurred twice here, both for fires that the local fire department needed assistance on that was beyond their capability. If it's a long term decrease in capability, it will be NOTAMd, and if it's very long term, it will even be in the Airport Facilities Directory or the DOD VFR/IFR Supplement, as shown in the remarks here:
Since I'm talking to a fellow firefighter, I'll expand on the above: the off airport incidents requiring ARFF capability here were a large pallet yard fire and a fuel tanker truck fire on the freeway. Both were beyond the ability of standard engine trucks to fight, and far beyond their foam capabilities......volume as well as quantity (most here carry only Class A foam, not Class B foam, so they can suppress a fuel just fine, but have no vapor protection capability or reignition protection) . In both situations, ARFF trucks and a support truck towing a foam trailer responded. That said, large Part 139 airports with airline service will do their best to maintain their assigned Index, as to reduce from it can cause issues with required coverage availability. So it would have to be a very serious incident to where ARFF units depart the airport, but at the same time, airports that are large enough to be Index D or Index E, will usually have reserve trucks they can release to off airport and still maintain their assigned Index. This is also important when responding to an accident on-airport, where the reserve trucks are kept available to keep the airport Index to its assigned level, and if that cannot be done due to the incident being large, etc, then airport operations will be curtailed accordingly.
A-9er
Well-Known Member
As a new, working DXer, no, we do NOT concern ourselves wit that stuff-not when there are METARs, TAFs, and NOTAMS to be considered first. Oh, and there are routes, reroutes, holding fuel to be considered, etc. As a practical matter, that will be resolved above your pay grade. If an airport is in the company OPS SPECS, then its ARRF is sufficient.