Anchorage and Fairbanks airports finish swapping PFAS foam out of crash trucks

The aircraft rescue and firefighting fleets at Alaska's two largest airports no longer carry PFAS firefighting foam. Sampling during the transition confirmed reductions of up to 99.999% in AFFF tanks, with non-detect results in piping and water tanks, the Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities said in the summer edition of its Statewide Aviation newsletter.

The Division of Statewide Aviation converted the firefighting vehicles at Ted Stevens Anchorage International Airport and Fairbanks International Airport from legacy aqueous film-forming foam, known as AFFF, to fluorine-free foam. Federal airport guidance now recognizes the shift away from PFAS-containing foam to fluorine-free foam for aircraft firefighting.

The change reaches the people who use the equipment. Aircraft rescue and firefighting crews have a direct stake in the conversion. The training and emergency tools they rely on are being replaced, and they must adapt equipment, procedures and response logistics as an airport switches from AFFF to fluorine-free foam.

Historical AFFF use is a suspected source of contamination already documented at Alaska airports. The Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation lists the Anchorage airport site as active, with AFFF-related PFAS found in shallow groundwater, surface water and soil. Preliminary sampling there dates to 2016. Alaska News has covered the wider spread of the chemicals: more than 20 public water systems face July 2026 deadlines to claim a share of national PFAS settlements, and the Mat-Su Borough has proposed spending $400,000 on groundwater cleanup traced to old firefighting foam.

Removing AFFF from the vehicles is separate from cleaning up legacy PFAS in airport soil and water. The contamination documented at the Anchorage site, which DEC still lists as active, remains an ongoing cleanup matter that the fleet conversion does not resolve.

What the conversion establishes is narrower and concrete. The firefighting vehicles at both airports now carry fluorine-free foam rather than PFAS-containing AFFF.