Heli-logging

Heli-logging, or helicopter logging, is a method of logging that uses helicopters to remove cut trees from forests by lifting them on cables attached to a helicopter.^[1] Helicopter logging is often used in inaccessible areas of forests. Because the use of helicopters reduces the level of infrastructure required to log in a specific location, the method also helps to reduce the environmental impact of logging. It also can increase the productivity in these remote areas.^[2]

History

After years of study by multiple helicopter manufacturers, in cooperation with the Forest Service, the first opening of timber for sale cut exclusively helicopter logging in April of 1971 on the Plumas National Forest in California.^[3]

Helicopter logging in the United States started in late 1971. Jack Erickson, of Erickson Air-Crane, along with Wes Lematta of Columbia Helicopters, started heli-logging Northern California in the Plumas National Forest near Taylorsville, California.^[4][5]

Process

Heli-logging is also known as standing stem harvesting, which is based on individual tree selection (ITS).

Helicopter logging ground crews will cut, clean, and mark the trees before the helicopter starts to work. Ground crews may be able to prepare fewer than six trees per day, and the helicopter will only be needed every few days. Since fewer roads need to be built to the site where the logging is taking place, and trees are extracted vertically, there is reduced damage to the surrounding trees and ground surface.[8]

Research by Roberts, Ward and Rollerson done in 2004 shows that post-logging

Although there is no direct cost from road construction or expansion, heli-logging incurs high costs. Operation of a helicopter as well as the selection processes and methods increase the cost. The use of a helicopter to transport the stems limits the size and weight of the selected trees more than equipment would using conventional logging.[6]

References