These videos of retardant and water drops by single engine air tankers were published by the Colorado Division of Fire Prevention and Control.
Below is the description for the above video provided by the CDFPC, and following that is the description for the second.
“Bitter Creek Fire, July 26 and 27, 2015: DFPC received dispatch at 1700. The fire was located half way between the border of Colorado and Rock Springs. The video was taken by Mike Miller, DFPC Pilot (contract) from Tanker 831 (T831). There were 5 SEATs working on the the fire when this video was taken.The objective was to contain this fire as soon as possible.”
“Video taken from T831 aircraft in Craig, CO. DFPC crew dropped water to assist firefighters on the ground fighting the Keystone Fire on July 24, 2015. Video taken by: Mike Miller, DFPC Pilot.” (The action starts at about 2:55.)
And here is a bonus — a short video from one of Colorado’s Multi-Mission Aircraft demonstrating the two cameras, visual and infrared.
Emergency Management Victoria will have two large air tankers from North America under firefighting contract again during their down-under summer.
Tanker 161, an RJ85. Photo supplied by RJ85 Australia.
Beginning December 1 they expect to have the same types of aircraft that they employed in the 2014/2015 bushfire season — one of Conair’s RJ85s, and Coulson’s Tanker 131, a C-130Q (known in Australia as Bomber 390).
The RJ85, N355AC, is en route now island hopping across the Pacific after departing Abbotsford, British Columbia at 2:04 p.m. MST on November 14. When heard from last, it left Guadalcanal Nov. 17 at 3:03 p.m. MST on its final leg and was due in Australia Nov. 17 at 8:52 p.m. MST, a six-hour flight. Last year because of the limited range of the RJ85, they used fuel bladders for the multi-day trip.
Coulson’s Tanker 131 (N130FF) is getting a new 4,000 USG tank and Smart Controller upgrade and is expected to depart for Australia by the end of next week.
During the 2014/2015 fire season the two air tankers completed 81 drops of fire retardant on fires in Victoria, South Australia and Western Australia.
New South Wales already has two air tankers on duty, T-910 (N612AX) a DC-10 operated by 10 Tanker Air Carrier, and Coulson’s Tanker 132, an L-382G (N405LC) which is a civilian stretched version of a C-130.
(UPDATED November 19, 2015. Scroll down to see the updated information.)
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Air tankers was one of the topics discussed today in a Washington D.C. hearing convened by the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources. Richard B. Zerkel, President of Lynden Air Cargo, was one of six witnesses who testified, two of whom brought up issues about firefighting aircraft.
One of Mr. Zerkel’s main points in his prepared testimony was the “double standard” used by the U.S. Forest Service in managing their government owned air tankers and privately owned air tankers. The USFS will not operate the seven HC-130H air tankers obtained from the Coast Guard according to Federal Aviation Administration regulations as Part 121 air carrier aircraft, but will instead fly them as public use aircraft. This allows them to make up their own standards, or, as they announced, use procedures created by the Coast Guard who will advise the USFS about maintenance of the aircraft. (Fire Aviation wrote about this issue in September, 2015.)
Mr. Zerkel, in referring to the first of the USFS HC-130Hs which began spraying retardant on fires this summer, described it as “equipped with the obsolete MAFFS II dispersant system and operated without appropriate FAA oversight.” The MAFFS system uses compressed air to force the retardant out of the 3,000-gallon tank. Spraying the liquid, rather than allowing gravity to let it fall from the tank, breaks up the retardant into small droplets which does not penetrate tree canopies as well as a conventional gravity-powered system. The plans are to eventually replace the MAFFS tanks with conventional gravity systems, but the Air Force, the agency converting the aircraft into air tankers, has been dithering about the contracts for the retardant system since July of 2014, without any result so far.
Mr. Zerkel argued that the federal fire aviation fleet should operate their aircraft under the same standards they require of their contractors, FAA Part 121. The Chair of the Committee, Senator Lisa Murkowski from Alaska, the state in which Lynden Air Cargo is based, agreed, saying the current system “is absolutely unacceptable. You go with your highest standard.”
Lynden Air Cargo has skin in the game. The company took one of their seven L-382 cargo planes, a civilian version of the Hercules C-130, and spent $4.5 million, according to Mr. Zerkel, to retrofit it as an air tanker and train personnel to fly and maintain it. That aircraft is leased to Coulson who operates it as Air Tanker 132, currently on a firefighting contract in New South Wales, Australia. It was disqualified from competing for the USFS next-gen Version 2 air tanker contract earlier this year because part of the Supplemental Type Certificate had not been awarded from the Federal Aviation Administration by the USFS deadline, which was a couple of months before the contracts were awarded.
Mr. Zerkel said, “The commercial aerial firefighting industry is entirely capable of providing all of the Forest Service’s Large Air Tanker requirements at considerably less expense than the current planned use of C-130H aircraft.” And further, “The non-regulated, public aircraft format, proposed for the government owned large air tanker fleet is inherently less safe than the rigorous standards the commercial fleet must adhere to and has set an unfair double standard.
Another witness from Alaska brought up the issue of inconsistent “carding”, or qualification of fire aviation assets. John “Chris” Maisch, the Alaska State Forester who was also representing the National Association of State Foresters, provided some examples of problems with “carding” individual pilots and aviation platforms.
Colorado sent its multi-mission fire detection and mapping aircraft, which was approved by the Forest Service in its Region 2, to Oregon where it had to be carded again by Forest Service Region 6.
A state of Alaska contract helicopter based out of California had been carded at the beginning of the fire season by the Forest Service and had to be re-carded by the Department of Interior’s Office of Aircraft Services when it reported to Alaska for work.
UPDATE: On November 19, 2015 we heard from Richard B. Zerkel, President of Lynden Air Cargo, who testified at the hearing. He wanted to make it clear that he does not recommend that the U.S. Forest Service operate their air tankers under CFR Part 121. But he would like to see them under CFR Part 137 Agricultural Aircraft Operations that covers aerial dispensing. Failing that, Mr. Zerkel thinks they should at least be required to obtain Supplemental Type Certificates for all modifications and document any maintenance and or operational training which should then be available to the general public.
The purpose-built air tanker in this design competition will have a crew of two pilots, 5,000 gallon retardant capacity, 2,500 nm ferry range, dash speed of 300 knots, and will be powered by turbofan or turboprop engines.
The winners will be announced in August of 2016. It will be interesting to see what they come up with.
The Coulson Group has signed a memorandum of understanding to provide fire retardant systems for Airbus’ C295W aircraft.
C295 test drop. Airbus photo.
Under the terms of the agreement Coulson will develop and manufacture a version of its Retardant Dropping System (RDS) which is already being used in two C-130 air tankers operated by Coulson.
The system installed in the C295W will consist of two roll-on/roll-off internal tanks which can be removed after the fire season. The aircraft will then be available for its conventional role as a ramp-equipped, multi-role transport able to carry cargo, troops, paratroops, or stretchers.
The RDS for the C295W will include two internal tanks of 924 gallons each (3,500 liters), for a total of 1,848 gallons (7,000 liters). When dropping, the flow-rate can be adjusted via the cockpit control panel according to the desired coverage, aircraft speed, and height over terrain.
A prototype C295W air tanker has been flying since 2013 as a proof of concept. After it was deemed a success, Airbus turned to Coulson to adapt their existing C-130 system to the smaller C295W.
Coulson Aircrane manager, Britton Coulson said:
We are an on-going partner for Airbus and expect to deliver multiple systems per year on a continuous basis. There are over 130 C-295’s flying around the world with many more on order that are potential RDS upgrade candidates.
C295 operated by the Chilean Navy. Airbus photo.
The C295, manufactured in Seville, Spain, was introduced in 2001. An enhanced performance version with winglets and uprated engines, the C295W, was announced in 2013. As of August, 2015, Airbus had delivered 136 of the C295 series aircraft with another 26 on order.
Coulson had the following promotional video produced for the 2015 Hercules Operators Conference.
Two water-scooping air tankers dropping water on the Princeton Fire in Ventura County, California interrupted a media briefing on November 7. The first air tanker appeared to just miss the crowd of reporters and cameras, but the aim of the second was better 😉 .
The 747-400BCF (Boeing Converted Freighter) that is being converted into the third generation Supertanker is in Victorville, California where scheduled maintenance, a C Check, is being performed.
The 747 Supertanker undergoing a C Check and retardant system installation at Victorville, California. Photo by Scott Olson, VP of Maintenance with Global Supertanker.
That inspection process, which was about 60 percent complete on November 1, should wrap up in November, after which it will remain at the facility for installation of the constant flow retardant dispersal system.
The first version of the 19,600-gallon Supertanker that Evergreen built was in a 747-200 freighter with roll-on/roll-off retardant tanks mounted on pallets. Later they built another version in a non-freighter 747-100 which required a lighter-weight set of tanks and a system suitable for that aircraft. The original heavier tanks were put into storage at Marana, Arizona and for a while were lost after Evergreen went into bankruptcy.
The retardant tanks are on the left, and on the right are the rubber seals that will be installed between the tanks. Photos by Scott Olson, VP of Maintenance with Global Supertanker.
Bob Soelberg, the Senior VP and Program Manager for Global Supertanker told us:
Earlier this year, Global SuperTanker purchased all the physical assets and intellectual property related to the SuperTanker except the -100 airframe itself. The original, heavier set of tanks were located and shipped to Victorville along with the other tanks, controls and all spare parts. The heavier tanks will be installed in the -400 following minor modifications that will eliminate the RO/RO capability.
This latest, or third generation Supertanker (with more powerful engines) will have a new FAA registration number, N744ST, when the aircraft is painted following the C Check and the modifications required to install the tank system.
Some of the maintenance tasks being done at Victorville include:
testing for skin separation from the frames,
evaluation of the trailing edge flap system,
removing the APU, which has been inspected and shipped to the vendor for detailed inspection and AD compliance work.
The skin doubler being installed around the four 16-inch nozzles. Photo by Scott Olson, VP of Maintenance with Global Supertanker.
One of the more complex tasks of installing the retardant system is cutting four 16-inch holes in the belly of the aircraft, and installing the nozzles, the connectors to the tanks, and a skin doubler system around the nozzles. The doubler, attached with approximately 1,300 rivets, will reinforce the structure around the nozzles and the connectors.
While this is being done, concurrent work involves modifications on the flight deck to install the monitoring and control panels used to activate the system.
Evergreen’s 747 SuperTanker first dropped on a fire in 2009 and last received Call When Needed contracts from CAL FIRE and the U.S. Forest Service in 2013. When it received the CWN contract the aircraft had been sitting at Marana without engines and needed a million-dollar “C” check in addition to other maintenance. The company decided that with an expensive expedited “C” check and the other needed work, it could have been ready to fight fire about the time the 2013 western fire season was drawing to a close. And the CWN contract had no guarantee of any revenue. So Bob Soelberg, the Vice President of Evergreen Supertanker Services at the time, said they would wait until the next year to get the maintenance done. A few months later, bankruptcy, and the company ceased to exist.
Jim Wheeler, President and CEO of Global SuperTanker Services which will be located in Colorado Springs, said they have hired most of the core personnel that worked on the SuperTanker program at Evergreen, including Mr. Soelberg who managed the program there. The Chief Pilot is Cliff Hale who has previous experience as an air tanker pilot.
The retardant is forced from the aircraft by compressed air using the same principle seen in the transportable Modular Airborne FireFighting System (MAFFS) that can be installed in a few hours into C-130s operated by the military. Unlike the newest version of the MAFFS2 which has two on-board air compressors, the SuperTanker will rely on suitable air compressors to be pre-positioned at an air tanker base. When MAFFS are deployed they meet up with one of the six specialized air compressor systems managed by the U.S. Forest Service that can refill the air tanks in 14 minutes when the on-board compressors fail to work properly, which is not uncommon according to a MAFFS crew member we talked with.
In August Mr. Wheeler told us they will consider installing an air compressor in a year or so.
