National Wildfire Coordinating Group

National Wildfire Coordinating Group
Name	National Wildfire Coordinating Group
Formation	1974
Type	Coordination body
Headquarters	Boise, Idaho
Region served	United States
Leader title	Chair

National Wildfire Coordinating Group is an interagency body that develops national standards, training, and protocols for wildfire management across federal, state, tribal, and local agencies in the United States. It convenes representatives from multiple land management and emergency response agencies to harmonize qualifications, doctrine, and incident management practice. The Group influences operational guidance used by agencies engaged in wildland fire suppression, prevention, and recovery.

History

The Group traces its origins to post‑fire reviews following incidents such as the Cerro Grande Fire and operational lessons from the Mann Gulch Fire, with formative coordination efforts during the 1970s involving agencies that later participated in the Federal Fire Policy revisions and interagency compacts. Early participants included the United States Forest Service, the Bureau of Land Management, and the National Park Service, alongside representatives from the Federal Emergency Management Agency and state fire authorities influenced by the National Interagency Fire Center framework. Major wildfire events—like the Yakama Nation region incidents and the large landscape fires in Yellowstone National Park—reinforced the need for standardized incident qualifications and contributed to subsequent charters and agreements. Over decades the Group adapted to statutory changes such as those affecting the Department of the Interior and the Department of Agriculture policy alignment, and to operational demands arising from climate‑driven increases in fire activity exemplified by events in California and the Great Basin.

Organization and Membership

Membership comprises senior representatives from agencies and organizations including the United States Forest Service, the Bureau of Land Management, the National Park Service, the Fish and Wildlife Service, the Bureau of Indian Affairs, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, and associations such as the National Association of State Foresters and the International Association of Fire Chiefs. Tribal representation includes leaders from federally recognized nations such as the Navajo Nation and the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation, while state participation reflects entities like the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection and the Oregon Department of Forestry. The Group coordinates with research institutions such as the Missoula Fire Sciences Laboratory, university programs at Colorado State University and University of Montana, and technical centers like the National Interagency Fire Center and the Wildland Fire Lessons Learned Center. Governance typically includes a rotating chair drawn from member agencies, subcommittees mirroring functional areas, and liaison roles with international partners like the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre.

Roles and Responsibilities

The Group develops interagency standards, qualification guides, and operational doctrine used by agencies including the United States Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Park Service; establishes national position task books and incident management guidance applied in responses from the Sierra National Forest to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park; and advises federal policy makers in the Department of Agriculture and the Department of the Interior. It provides a governance forum for establishing national mobilization protocols used during large incidents such as the Camp Fire (2018) and the 2017 North Bay fires, and shapes qualification currency recognized by state entities like the Texas A&M Forest Service and the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources. The Group also liaises with organizations involved in aviation, logistics, and safety including the National Transportation Safety Board when safety investigations intersect with wildland fire operations.

Standards, Training, and Qualifications

A primary output is the national set of standards and the interagency "Red Card" system for wildland firefighter qualifications, aligning position qualifications used by the United States Forest Service with those employed by the Bureau of Land Management and state partners such as the Arizona State Forestry Division. Training curricula reference courses taught at centers like the National Advanced Fire and Resource Institute and university extension programs at University of California, Berkeley and Michigan State University. Qualification standards incorporate lessons from investigations such as the South Canyon Fire and are codified into position task books and incident qualification matrices applied by the National Wildfire Coordinating Group membership. The Group maintains standards impacting aerial firefighting managed by contractors familiar to the Aerial Firefighting Use and Safety community and certifica­tion practices used by the Federal Aviation Administration for rotorcraft and air tanker operations.

Incident Coordination and Operations

The Group provides frameworks for the National Incident Management System used across incidents from regional fires in the Great Plains to complex incidents in the Pacific Northwest. It standardizes incident command qualifications, resource typing, and mobilization procedures used by incident management teams drawn from entities like the Interagency Hotshot Crew program, the Incident Management Team networks, and state firefighting forces such as the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation wildland units. These standards inform operational plans during major events such as the Hayman Fire and multi‑jurisdictional responses coordinated through the National Interagency Coordination Center and the Federal Emergency Management Agency during declarations. Tactics, safety protocols, and logistical support guidance produced under the Group influence resource ordering, staging, and demobilization across federal and state boundaries.

Research, Technology, and Publications

The Group sponsors and disseminates technical standards, field guides, and best‑practice documents developed in coordination with research bodies such as the U.S. Geological Survey, the Missoula Fire Sciences Laboratory, and academic centers at University of California, Davis and Oregon State University. Publications include interagency manuals, qualification guides, and historic incident analyses used by planners and practitioners in agencies like the National Park Service and the United States Forest Service. It fosters applied research into fire behavior modeling tools such as those used in LANDFIRE and supports adoption of technologies employed by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration for smoke forecasting, and by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration for satellite fire detection. Collaborative outputs also appear in workshops and conferences alongside partners like the Society of American Foresters and the International Association of Wildland Fire.

Category:Firefighting organizations in the United States