On 6-7 May, the National Aerial Firefighting Centre (NAFC) delivered Australia’s first National Air Desk Forum. This two-day event was attended by representatives from each state and territory and hosted by the NSW Rural Fire Service (RFS) State Training Academy in Dubbo. The forum included tours, networking opportunities, training sessions, and workshops designed to cover the specific challenges and opportunities faced by the sector.

With the reliance on aviation assets for emergency response increasing and the Australian Government having recently expanded the fully sharable and multicable NAFC contracted national aviation assets, the aerial firefighting environment is becoming more complex. These complexities only highlight the growing need for knowledge sharing, collaboration, and exploring nationally consistent approaches to the management and sharing of aircraft.

Substantial work is already underway within agencies and through NAFC collaboration groups such as the Aviation Safety Group. However, air desk personnel have historically been an underrepresented group within this larger body of work. NSW RFS Deputy Commissioner Ben Millington was instrumental in recognising this gap and requested NAFC, with the support of the NAFC Strategic Committee, to provide a platform for air desk personnel to share and collaborate.

The forum was positively received by attendees and was recognised as a valuable opportunity to improve the relationships and collaboration between different state and territory air desks who were enthusiastically sharing doctrine, policies, and advice. Forum attendees requested the creation of a National Air Desk Community of Practice (COP) facilitated by NAFC, which would allow air desk personnel to continue to work together productively and build on the collaborative environment that was core to the forum.  

NAFC are in the early stages of developing the National Air Desk COP and are excited to be pioneering the creation of such a valuable program. Above all, NAFC is committed to safety and is proud that the National Air Desk Forum resulted in such positive strides forward.