EVALUATING THE LOCATIONS OF THE FIRE HELICOPTER PLATFORMS IN THE REGION OF BURSA

In Turkey, the General Directorate of Forestry (GDF) utilizes helicopters in various forestry activities such as firefighting, forest protection, wildlife management, shipping, and other activities. In firefighting activities, mostly Russian-designed “Mil Mi-8MTV-1” series helicopters are rented by the GDF during the fire season. These fire helicopters are designed to carry up to 20 people and 2.5 tons of water with a special bucket attached underneath. In this study, it was aimed to evaluate the location of the fire helicopter platforms in the border of Bursa Forestry Regional Directorate (FRD). In the solution process, the areas reached by the fire helicopters in the critical response time was determined using proximity analysis in ArcGIS. Accessible areas were also found for productive forest and degraded forest separately. The results indicated that 85.97 % of the total area of FRD was reached by the fire helicopter within the critical response time while it was 84.06 % for the forested areas. In terms of fire sensitivity degrees, 79.18 % of the first degree sensitive forests were accessed within the critical response time, while all of the second and third degree sensitive forests were reached on time. On the other hand, the accessible forest areas were 85.61 % and 81.21 % for productive forest and degraded forest. These results suggested that location of the fire helicopter platforms should be re-evaluate and possible new platforms should be located in Bursa FRD in order to improve the efficiency of the helicopter fleet and access the forest area in the critical response time. In this process, GIS techniques should be employed by the fire managers to evaluate the optimum locations for the fire helicopter platforms. 