National Wildfire Coordinating Group

Air Operations Map

Product Description

The Air Operations Map provides air operations with enough detail to aid in locating key features on an incident.  A secondary Air Operations map, the Pilot Map, may be created for pilots.

Target Audience

Air Operations Branch, pilots 

Guidelines

  • Standard Incident Command System (ICS) symbology.
  • Minimal clutter on map.
  • A table that includes the latitude and longitude coordinates in Degrees, Decimal Minutes for point features.
  • Pilot map is typically small for easy lap reading in the aircraft.

Standard Elements

All map products produced should include the STANDL-SGD cartographic elements.  Scale bar must be in nautical miles rather than statute miles.

Data

  • Incident perimeter, ICS line and limited/relevant point features.
  • Division and Branch breaks and labels.
  • Airports, helibases.
  • Aviation hazards (e.g., transmission lines, mountain peaks with elevation labels, towers).
  • Table or labels showing latitude and longitude of key locations.
  • Roads.
  • Key landmarks. 
  • Hydrography (e.g., rivers, lakes).
  • Temporary Flight Restrictions (TFRs) (when in place) and TFR number, height, and frequency, if available.
  • Elevation shaded relief or Federal Aviation Administration sectionals.
  • Other SITL-requested data.

Examples

These are examples from actual incidents and may include non-standard elements.

Also note that examples use the standard symbols at the time of their creation and may not reflect the current GeoOps symbology. Map elements, incident features, and composition remain consistent across these visual changes.

  1. Air Operations Map - Cedar Creek and Cub Creek 2
  2. Air Operation Map - Delta Lake
  3. Air Operations Map - 2010 Wrangler Fire
  4. Pilot Map - 2023 Flying V
  5. Pilot Map - 2016 Beaver Creek Fire
  6. Pilot Map - 2017 Pinal Fire
  7. Air Operations Map - 2015 National Creek Complex

 

Page Last Modified / Reviewed: 
2023-07-20