Summit Helicopters Inc.

Summit Helicopters Inc., doing business as C 3 M, is a veteran-owned small business based in Salem, Virginia that operates exclusively as a prime contractor (100% of awards) providing specialized aerial services—helicopter flight operations, aerial herbicide and larvicide spraying, and fire suppression support—to federal land management and natural resource agencies under total small business set-asides and full-and-open competition. The company competes predominantly under total small business set-asides, with set-aside designations on 57 of the 157 awards in the source data.

Summit Helicopters' customer base concentrates on interior and wildland-fire-focused agencies, driven by the National Interagency Fire Center's dominance in both dollar magnitude and task-order volume. The National Interagency Fire Center accounts for 12 awards valued at $85.5 million (combined potential value), anchored by a $50 million multiple-award Indefinite Delivery Contract for Type 1, 2, and 3 helicopter support services for fire suppression, fire monitoring, law enforcement, and administrative missions within the United States, Canada, and Mexico. The Department of the Interior—split across the Bureau of Land Management Idaho Region (3 awards, $12.9 million), the Departmental Offices Interior Business Center (6 awards, $12.8 million), the National Park Service Southeast Region (4 awards, $8.1 million), and the Fish and Wildlife Service regional offices (12 awards, $2.2 million)—collectively represents the second concentration point. The Department of Agriculture Forest Service spans multiple regions, with the Southern Region (R8) holding 12 awards valued at $4.6 million. These five customer clusters account for 91% of the combined potential value across all awards.

Summit Helicopters holds five primary parent IDVs. The $50 million multiple-award Helicopter Support Services contract with the National Interagency Fire Center (awarded January 2024, extending through December 2033) serves as the platform for numerous task orders covering Type 1, 2, and 3 aircraft for fire and resource management across North America. A $11.5 million single-award IDC with the Bureau of Land Management Idaho Region (awarded May 2024, extending through April 2029) provides Type 2 helicopter flight services for BLM fire operations and has issued two delivery orders to date, valued at approximately $1.34 million and $1.59 million. A $1 million single-award IDC with the USDA Forest Service R8 (awarded February 2024, extending through February 2029) provides aerial larvicide applications for spongy moth suppression across the George Washington & Jefferson National Forests and Shenandoah National Park. A $4.2 million single-award IDC with the National Interagency Fire Center (awarded March 2022, extended through October 2022) provided Douglas-manufactured T2 EU helicopters for firefighting operations. Additional smaller vehicles include a Basic Ordering Agreement carrying 6 task orders valued at $2 million combined potential value.

Representative recent prime work includes a $1.59 million June 2025 delivery order from the Bureau of Land Management for Type 2 helicopter flight services supporting fire operations in Twin Falls, Idaho, with performance extending through October 2025; a $861,161 May 2025 purchase order from the USDA Forest Service R8 for aerial larvicide applications across 26,000 acres in the George Washington & Jefferson and Shenandoah areas to suppress spongy moth populations; a $1.69 million August 2023 definitive contract with the Department of the Interior Fish and Wildlife Service Region 4 for aerial phragmites spraying across six North Carolina coastal refuges extending through December 2027; and a $1.59 million January 2023 delivery order from the National Interagency Fire Center for Type 2 surge-tail helicopter support services. These awards demonstrate Summit Helicopters' core capability in rotating specialized aircraft and crews into federal wildland fire and natural resource management operations at scale.

Activity shows stability with modest recent decline. Annual award counts ran 5 (2022), 6 (2023), 7 (2024), 4 (2025), and 1 (2026 year-to-date); the 2026 figure reflects partial-year data. Recompete risk is minimal: only 1 award (valued at $1.7 million combined potential value) reaches ultimate completion within the next twenty-four months.

Service Contract Inventory data captures a subset of Summit Helicopters' federal service work and shows SCI-reportable invoiced revenue of $3.1 million in FY2023 and $1.8 million in FY2024, scaling roughly 2.6 FTEs in 2023 and 1.5 FTEs in 2024. Government-paid hourly rates on SCI-reportable prime contracts ranged from a 10th percentile of $507.80/hour through a median of $525.90/hour to a 90th percentile of $1,015.09/hour, reflecting a mix of crew labor (flight operations, ground support) and senior technical oversight. Across SCI-reportable prime contracts, Summit Helicopters performed 100% of contractor hours with no subcontractor hours reported, indicating the company builds its own delivery teams and does not rely on subcontractors for service-contract work captured in SCI.

The vendor's NAICS concentration reflects its core service line: Support Activities for Forestry (31 awards), Nonscheduled Chartered Passenger Air Transportation (30 awards), and Nonscheduled Chartered Freight Air Transportation (30 awards) dominate the portfolio, with smaller representation under Pesticide and Other Agricultural Chemical Manufacturing (13 awards) for herbicide and larvicide work. PSC codes align similarly, with Natural Resources/Conservation—Forest-Range Fire Suppression/Presuppression (31 awards) and Natural Resources/Conservation—Aerial Fertilization/Spraying (30 awards) as the leading categories.