The Cedar City Regional Airport has reached record-breaking activity this summer, as multiple wildfires across the region drive an unprecedented number of firefighting missions, stretching both its fuel supply and aircraft capacity. (Photo: Liv Kelleher, KUTV)
CEDAR CITY, Utah (KUTV) — The Cedar City Regional Airport has reached record-breaking activity this summer, as multiple wildfires across the region drive an unprecedented number of firefighting missions, stretching both its fuel supply and aircraft capacity.
“This has been a record-breaking year so far,” said airport manager Tyler Galetka. “Just in July alone, we’ve had 16 incidents the aerial tankers have responded to out of Cedar City. We’ve had 268 missions and over 800,000 gallons of fire retardant pumped this month.”
Currently, the airport is fueling fixed-wing firefighting aircrafts and helicopters working on the France Canyon, Forsyth and Monroe Canyon fires in Utah, the White Sage and Dragon Bravo fires in Arizona, and the Mount Iris fire in Nevada.
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At one point, the airport had up to seven large air tankers and 12 helicopters coming and going to fuel and pick up retardant at the base simultaneously.
“We definitely have gone to the brink of capacity at times,” Galetka said. “With those 12 helicopters, we actually ran into a scenario where we had to close our secondary runway to park aircraft for the Forsyth Fire.”
That kind of traffic also means more fuel.
Cedar City’s fixed-base operator, GateOne Aviation, typically stores 34,000 gallons of jet fuel in on-site tanks, plus an additional 13,000 gallons in fueling trucks. But Galetka said on high-volume fire days, the airport can burn through 30,000 to 40,000 gallons of fuel in a single day.
Friday, a major fueling disruption occurred when a semi-truck fire in California shut down a key freeway, preventing two of five scheduled 7,500-gallon jet fuel deliveries from making it to the airport.
“That's where we ran into some fuel shortages,” Galetka said. “Unfortunately, we did see some aircraft divert to St. George Airport to receive jet fuel there. However, they still had to come to Cedar City to load up their fire retardant.”
Only two aircraft were diverted, each refueling multiple times in St. George, while the other tankers remained in Cedar City and used what was left of the available fuel until the next load arrived.
“These aircraft are pretty quick, and so a diversion to St. George is very minimal,” Galetka said. “But we anticipate there was a slight delay on all the loads to the fire due to that fuel delay and non-delivery.”
He estimated each diversion added about 20 to 30 minutes — not long, but in wildfire response, still potentially significant.
Galetka said this kind of disruption is rare, and that internal conversations are already underway to help prevent similar issues in the future.
“We’re always focusing on improving from our mistakes and moving forward,” he said. “We had some unfortunate circumstances happen, and we’re hopeful to have those corrected and never see those happen again.”
In addition to supporting firefighting operations, the Cedar City airport also operates 12 commercial flights a week to Salt Lake City and hosts Southern Utah University's flight training program. SUU's helicopter program is the largest in the nation, keeping the airport busy year-round.
The pressure isn't just felt on the ground, but in the air too.
“We are a non-towered airport, so we don’t have an air traffic control facility,” Galetka said. “Once the aircraft are in the air, it gets very complex. We’re working to try to build an air traffic control facility here at Cedar City to keep it a little more controlled and safe.”
Air traffic control for CDC currently operates through Salt Lake Center. With flight volume fluctuating during fire season, Galetka said congestion on radio frequencies is a regular challenge.
“There can be confusion at times, which is why we're working to build an air traffic control facility here at Cedar City,” he said.
Plans for a control tower are included in the airport’s master plan, but the project is still in early funding stages. Galetka said towers typically cost $10 million or more.
“Towers are very expensive,” he said. “We’re heavily pursuing funding for that right now.”
He praised airport crews and partners for their performance under pressure and emphasized the importance of their mission.
“It becomes the Wild West overnight,” he said. “The tenants on the airport have been great to accommodate air tankers. They know that our priority to get to fires is really important for life-saving and property-saving measures.”
He says they will continue to adapt as needed to accommodate as many firefighting aircraft as safely possible.
“We want to give a shoutout and prayer to all the firefighters and pilots flying on these fires locally, as well as all those affected by these devastating fires this season.”