Helicopter Support Services - Type 2

The Department of Agriculture Forest Service Fire and Aviation Management National Interagency Fire Center awarded a master IDIQ on January 1, 2024 for helicopter support services (primarily Type 2 aircraft) with ordering authority through December 31, 2032. The vehicle carries a $1.5 billion shared ceiling and is unrestricted—no set-aside designations apply. Orders remain active with nearly 6.5 years of ordering period remaining.

The vehicle funds fire suppression, monitoring, law enforcement, and administrative missions across the United States, Canada, and Mexico using Type 1, 2, and 3 helicopters meeting specified equipment and certification standards. All 240 task orders issued to date employ firm fixed-price or firm fixed-price-with-economic-price-adjustment contract types and are performance-based.

Ordering velocity has decelerated materially: 108 orders in 2024, 88 in 2025, and 44 through mid-July 2026 year-to-date. The portfolio shows obligated dollars of $345.4 million against a combined potential value of $344 million across task orders—meaning the vehicle is fully obligated. Despite high obligation rates, recent awards continue at roughly 44 per year (annualized from 2026 activity), indicating sustained demand, though the trend suggests a slowdown from initial rollout peaks.

Helicopter Express LLC dominates by order count with 42 awards worth $78.8 million potential value. When ranked by potential value, however, Precision, LLC leads with five orders valued at $79.2 million combined, followed closely by Helicopter Express at $78.8 million. The top five primes by potential value—Precision, Helicopter Express, Heli-1 Corp, Hillsboro Aviation, and Capitol Helicopters—hold 68 percent of combined potential value. A competitive long tail of 23 additional contractors (28 total primes) holds the remainder, indicating moderate concentration with material secondary- and tertiary-tier activity.

Customer concentration is extreme: the National Interagency Fire Center (the contracting office's parent) places 222 of 240 orders (92.5%) worth $342.4 million. The Department of Interior National Park Service Intermountain Region, Bureau of Land Management Idaho Region, and other DOI entities collectively generate 18 orders with $1.5 million combined potential value. The vehicle functions effectively as a single-customer IDIQ serving fire suppression operations.

Individual task orders range from under $10,000 (call-when-needed support orders) to $4.1 million (a 2026 exclusive-use award to Heli-1 Corp through December 2028). Typical small orders cluster in the $100,000–$300,000 range with performance periods of one to four months. The $4.1 million outlier reflects a multi-year exclusive-use contract, an exception to the typical pattern. Recent awards from April through July 2026 show task-order ceiling values typically between $100,000 and $350,000, with completion dates spanning one to twelve months, though some extend through 2028.