NATIONAL INTERAGENCY FIRE CENTER  | BOISE, IDAHO

We took a long road trip in September of 2019, stopping and photographing some points-of-interests along the way.  

Fire Fact | 159 USFS wildland firefighters and DOI fire personnel have been deployed to assist with the  Australian bushfires intermittently throughout December 2019 and January 2020.

Though we were on the outside looking in, it was pretty hectic as firefighters responded to the Center ready for deployment and coordination of resources.

Fire Fact | There is a current resource request from Australia for additional U.S. fire mutual aid, which is being coordinated through the NIFC.

It was great to see this is a large organization with multiple facets of fire-related activities at this Center, covering very large areas of real estate.

ABOUT THE NATIONAL INTERAGENCY FIRE CENTER (NIFC)

The National Interagency Fire Center located at the Boise Airport in Idaho and is compromised of 55 acres.  It has areas for firefighting equipment, aircraft ramp operations, aircraft retardant tanker operations and administrative functions supporting the mission of wildland fire and other emergencies.

Their main focus is wildland firefighting but they also support other emergency responses, such as flooding, hurricanes, earthquakes, volcano eruptions, riots and terrorist attacks.

Located at the NIFC are the Great Basin Cache and Returns Warehouse, National Interagency Coordination Center (NICC), Radio cache, Remoted automated weather stations, Smokejumpers and tours.

They have a great website that provides a lot of fire situation reports, national news and other fire-related information, which can be found at https://www.nifc.gov/

Hours of operation are Monday – Friday, 0800 – 1630 hours MST.  There are tours that you can take that usually are available by reservation only.  This is generally during the week and are available by calling for a reservation. The one-to-two hour tour is usually available outside of fire peak season which is during the months of June through September.

(c) 2020 NW Fire Blog – Posted 1/10/2020 @ 2305 hours PST