A team gets points in two catagories; Scoops and Screams
A fire diving team gets one point for every member that successfully gets scooped by a bucket or scoop. Bonus points are awarded for multi-person scoops. The teams are also judged by their drops, here points are awarded by the volume of the scream on the way down, and the style and difficulty of the fall and landing.
With the wet winter and spring most Fire Diving teams were not ready for the Florida fires, however, a few teams have been able to make the first major fire of the season. Fire Divng in Florida has its own unique problems, with all of that water it has been difficult finding where the helicopters are dipping, and then there has been the problem with the alligators. Teams have been forced to have one team member act as gator lookout, this has reduced the scores because of the fewer divers in the water. One member of the Bay Area Bucket divers just made it to the bucket ahead of a 10' alligator. Jim Angelo said "I saw the bucket, I saw the alligator, we were behind in points so I went for it". It is a good thing that Jim has been doing a lot of swimming during the off season.
| The scores after the first round: | |
| Florida Fire Flyers (of Ft Myers) | 17 |
| Bay Area Bucket Divers | 14 |
| Gator Bait Bucket Divers | 13 |
| Jamaican Smokers | 12 |
| New Yawk Hawks | 12 |
| The Ft Myers Blaze Bouncers | 9 |
| Wing and a Flare | 7 |
A major fire in the wine country of northern California has drawn Fire Diving teams from all over the west. With six helicopters flying scoops were abundent and the action was hot and heavy. Everything was going well until a member of F.I.S.T. (Firedivers In Sacred Trust) accidently had a premature drop over one of the winerys (at least that was his story). Either he was lucky or extremly accurate and made a direct hit on one of the wine vats. After that the compitition just fell apart, there were a few hard core Fire Divers that tried to keep the compitition alive, but with a large number of the teams aiming for the wine vats rather than the flames, the event ended early. If you thought that it could get crowded in a helicopter bucket, you should see how many Fire Divers can fit in a wine vat. The score for "screams" was unavailabe due to misplaced judges .... the winerys are being searched.
| Scoops | Vats | |
| Northern Mountain Fire Diver's Association | 6 | 2 |
| Wing and a Flare | 4 | 0 |
| Dante Divers (Firenza, IA) | 3 | 1 |
| DeepHeat Fire Divers | 3 | 1 |
| Sitka Sizzlers | 8 | 3 |
| The Half Moon Bay Hell Hoppers | 4 | 2 |
| F.I.S.T. for Firedivers In Sacred Trust" | 5 | 3 |
| Bay Area Bucket Divers | 7 | 2 |
| AquaFlame Fire Divers | 3 | 1 |
| Toronto Harley Owners Fire Diving Team | 4 | 2 |
"I swear I missed my landing spot, any way thats my story and Im stickin to it!!! But that wine was good....."
Rick from F.I.S.T
"3 scoops - 1 vat"..... "we could'a made 5 scoops if that vat hadn't contained such a nice cabernet..."
Chuck Narad
AquaFlame Fire Divers
The Half Moon Bay Hell Hoppers have coordinated their annual picnic with a CDF Control Burn and combined their firedive practice session and annual picnic! "We just fill our goodie bags with rock cod before our scoop (being very careful to adjust for weight of the fish) and after our show-stopping soft landings (inflate BCD then purge Octo before landing) our BBQ fish buffet is ready. The potato salad comes out very creamy but you can forget the jello molds."