Business is not exactly booming at the Billings, Montana air tanker base this summer. By this time last year they had pumped about 300,000 gallons of retardant. This year they have only pumped 14,000 gallons for six fires. The 10 employees there, after doing all the maintenance and weed whacking they could, have resorted to cribbage and reading.
Here is an excerpt from an article in the Billings Gazette:
In a business where speed, safety and adrenaline are as much a part of the mixture as water and fire retardant, slow days this summer at the Billings air tanker base seem unreasonably long to Bob Dobias.
“Even the few days we’ve flown it gets your adrenaline flowing and makes the time fly,” said Dobias, manager for Hunot Retardant. Hunot supplies the orange firefighting fluid to federal and state agencies for their aircraft at the east end of the Billings Logan International Airport.
As dark clouds build to the south, the base crew looks toward the gathering storm.
“The fire season isn’t over by a long shot,” said Jim Hassler, air tanker base manager for the Bureau of Land Management.
That’s a point he keeps reminding his crew of daily. That’s why they drill, watch videos and continually stress safety.
On Aug. 22 last year, the Dunn Mountain fire ignited in the Bull Mountains. By the time it was out, it had scorched 100,000 acres. That could easily happen again, any day, Hassler said. There’s plenty of tall grass nourished by a wet summer. Give it a few days of heat to dry out, and it makes prime tinder.
Fires like Dunn Mountain and the 10,200-acre Cascade fire west of Red Lodge kept the base hopping last summer. By this time last year, the base had pumped about 300,000 gallons of retardant.
If last season was a gusher, though, this season is a drip. So far, only a little more than 14,000 gallons have been pumped into aircraft on six fires. And last year was quieter than two earlier summers. In 2008, 490,000 gallons were pumped and in 2006, 1.25 million gallons.
Thanks Dick
