Water used by helicopters to fight fire less than watering grass

Water used by helicopters to fight fire less than watering grass


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SALT LAKE CITY — With water levels in reservoirs being so low, is it safe to be taking out so much water from our reservoirs to fight all of the fires we're dealing with?

Water watchers say the levels in Utah's reservoirs are low and getting lower all the time.

"Up on the Weber Basin, you're running anywhere from 25 percent to 50 percent of (capacity)," said Randy Julander with the Natural Resources Conservation Service.

But, Julander says, the amount of water being taken out of the reservoirs is just a drop in the bucket, if you'll pardon the comparison, to what many of us use to feed our grass every night.


They're not taking out a whole lot of water out of the reservoir compared to one night's watering of the lawns in Ogden might be.

–Randy Julander


"They're not taking out a whole lot of water out of the reservoir compared to one night's watering of the lawns in Ogden might be," he said.

Julander says when helicopters douse hot spots with fire with water, it may look like they're using more than they really are. Crews don't use the drops to put the fire out, per se.

"The containment line around the fire, they use that to prevent the fire from spreading," Julander said. "Then the fire inside dies out when the fuel is exhausted."

Helicopters can carry between 100 and 300 gallons per drop. But the average garden hose or set of sprinklers can shoot out 10 gallons per minute.

"At 10 gallons a minute, you're using 600 gallon an hour to water your lawn," he said.

Essentially, if your sprinklers cover five or six areas of your lawn, and if you set your sprinklers to water each part of your lawn for about 10 minutes, Julander says you could be using roughly the equivalent of two helicopter drops worth of water on your grass every time you turn your sprinklers on.

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Paul Nelson

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