Fire Officials and Marines to Work on Collaborative Firefighting Strategy

By Alison St John / Reporter, KPBS Public Broadcasting

Published November 26, 2007 at 5:54 AM PST

This story was published more than 17 years ago.

California fire officials have a meeting scheduled this week with the Marines to work on new protocols that would allow military helicopters to mobilize faster in future fires. KPBS reporter Alison St

California fire officials have a meeting scheduled this week with the Marines to work on new protocols that would allow military helicopters to mobilize faster in future fires. KPBS reporter Alison St John has more.

Unlike the Navy, the Marines in San Diego don't yet have a memorandum of understanding with Cal Fire that allows military helicopters to be deployed locally if there's an emergency in San Diego. The request has to go through Federal channels, which contributed to delays in mobilizing helicopters in last month's fires.

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Cal Fire Battalion chief Ray Chaney is in charge of air operations for San Diego. He acknowledges Marine's don't have a lot of time to train with other agencies.

Chaney: You know, we realize that the United States Marine Corps has the primary task of defending our nation, so one of the things we are going to be discussing with them is available time.

For example, Chaney says annual training would familiarize Marine pilots with the communication systems used by fire fighting agencies. Camp Pendleton is now armed with more than a dozen water buckets for firefighting copters.

Cal Fire aims to develop an operating plan like the one that already exists with National Guard and the Navy, so Marines can play more of a role to fight fires in San Diego County.

Alison St John, KPBS News.

Alison St John

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Alison St John currently serves as a general assignment reporter and occasionally co-hosts KPBS Midday Edition. She fell in love with KPBS Radio when she arrived in San Diego in 1985 and first heard NPR. She has been a voice on KPBS Radio since 1989, and has served as a news reporter for radio, TV and the web, as well as anchoring, hosting, producing and editing. Alison has reported on stories about North County and was based in the KPBS' North County Bureau. Alison covered the metro beat during the critical period of the San Diego City pension crisis, and the education beat while Alan Bersin was the controversial Superintendent of San Diego City School District. She covered health when the industry was converting to managed care and told welfare reform stories in the late 1990s when Clinton was “ending welfare as we know it.” She has covered land use issues extensively, looking at the challenges of meeting a growing population while preserving community character, and developing a better transportation system to meet environmental concerns. She has done many stories on the military in San Diego, and the series she edited on the challenges veterans face returning from active duty to civilian life won “Best of Show” from the San Diego Society of Professional Journalists. She occasionally hosts the KPBS Roundtable and KPBS Midday Edition. Alison has won awards from the San Diego Press Club, the Society of Professional Journalists, the Associated Press TV and Radio Association, and the California Golden Mike Awards. Alison was born in Tanzania, brought up in Scotland, and earned her degree in psychology and sociology from Durham University in England. Her postgraduate diploma is in student counseling. She worked in England, Nigeria, Switzerland, Belgium, India, and Japan before moving to the United States in 1981. She now lives in Oceanside and enjoys how her community is growing and changing.