The Grangeville Smokejumpers function as both a local and a national resource for wildland fire operations and other agency missions. Based at the Grangeville Air Center (GAC) and hosted by the combined fire management zone of the Nez Perce and Clearwater National Forests in central Idaho, the Grangeville jumpers provide aerially delivered firefighters across this administrative area.

As a shared national resource, GAC jumpers respond to fires throughout the rest of the Western United States, as well. Like all Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management Smokejumpers, Grangeville jumpers specialize in the use of parachutes and fixed-wing aircraft for rapid deployment to remote incidents in mountain and desert terrain. But jumpers travel by vehicle, on foot, by helicopter, or by boat--whatever it takes to get the job done.

GAC is staffed by approximately 30 Smokejumpers, veteran firefighters typically ranging in age from their twenties to their fifties. GAC employees possess skills and experiences from a wide array of fields, from ranching and guiding to teaching and research.

This diversity allows GAC jumpers to serve the U.S. Forest Service, the Bureau of Land Management, the Bureau of Indian Affairs, the National Park Service, and other agencies in a variety of capacities: from the rapid and aggressive suppression of wildland fires threatening life, property, or sensitive habitat, to the safe restoration of endemic fire and ecological systems.

Above all, the Grangeville Smokejumpers provide initial attack resources for remote wildland fire incidents. But GAC jumpers frequently serve as overhead and crewmembers for extended-attack suppression operations, prescribed-fire assignments, and other resource-management activities. (In recent years GAC jumpers have assisted with prescribed and wildland fire-use incidents throughout the Western, Mid-Western, and Southern states; timber marking and tree climbing throughout Idaho; NASA search operations in Texas; hurricane relief in the Gulf region; USDA arborist inspections in Chicago and New York City; and with wildland firefighter training courses around the country.)

The Grangeville Smokejumpers utilize a DeHavilland Twin Otter aircraft for the delivery of personnel and cargo to wildland fire incidents. As members of the Region One Smokejumper program, all GAC Smokejumpers undergo extensive annual training in the use of parachutes in mountainous terrain at the U.S. Forest Service Aerial Fire Depot in Missoula, Montana.

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