Texas A&M Forest Service hosted the fourth annual Sisters in Fire event on Saturday, Sept. 28, at Sam Houston State University Bearkat Camp. Twenty-three young women between the ages of 12 and 18 from across 23 Texas counties participated.
Participants were split into squads, or teams, for the day and rotated through four stations. Each station introduced them to various topics and skills relating to the wildland firefighting profession, including how to suppress wildfires with fire engines, bulldozers, chainsaws and hand tools. They also learned leadership and communication skills that are critical for wildland firefighting crews.
At this year’s event, a Fire Boss from Dauntless Air, an amphibious aircraft frequently used on Texas wildfires, made two water drops to demonstrate the vital coordination between aerial firefighting resources and ground personnel during a wildfire incident. Participants were also able to interact and board a Texas Parks and Wildlife Department helicopter—a craft commonly used to haul buckets of water to provide pinpoint water drops or conduct initial attacks on remote wildfires.
Participants put everything they learned to the test during the final event of the day—a prescribed fire demonstration. While the instructors burned a small area of grass, the young women answered questions and applied what they learned to a real-world scenario.
