Los Angeles County’s new S-70i Firehawk, helicopter 22, being tested at Centennial, Colorado May 7, 2020. Photo by @skippyscage.The legislature in Colorado recently passed bills that would enhance the very small fleet of aircraft that can assist firefighters on wildland fires, but now it is up to the Governor who could change the provisions in the legislation or veto them.
If Governor Jaris Polis signs the bills without major changes, it would increase significantly the number of days of funding for single engine air tankers, contract helicopters, and a large air tanker. It would also enable the purchase of a Sikorsky S-70 Firehawk helicopter and provide funds to lease a second large air tanker or another resource identified by the Colorado Firefighting Air Corps.
The bills very easily and quickly passed both the Senate and the House in the last few days, but it is unknown when Governor Polis will make his decisions.
Many of the S-70 helicopters that have been converted to Firehawks in recent years have had the work done in Colorado by United Rotorcraft in Englewood.
8 Comments
Hopefully DPFC takes some of that $ and buys dozers, trains IA dozer operators and strategically places them across the State. If DFPC wants to be relevant (and like Cal Fire) they would be everybody’s best friend with a fleet of dozers since dozers catch fires!
So far Polis has been very supportive of getting resources for fire supression.
Jack, I totally agree ! Relying on county road depts for their dozers need to change. They are slow to respond and do not always have adequate training to perform the job. Fire Districts don’t have the funding to have an I.A. Dozer able to respond.
This would be an excellent expansion of the State of Colorado providing a resource most, if not all , fire depts here don not have, just like air resources.
The Beautiful State of Colorado CAN NOT AND SHOULD NOT CONTINUE TO RELY ON THE U.S.F.S. !
After last summer’s nightmare, COLORADO NEEDS TO TAKE CARE OF IT’s OWN !
Yes he has. But he can do sooo much more ! The climate HAS changed, period and he must step up and increase his support for wildland fire suppression.
It is only GOING TO GET WORSE ! What is the loss of a life or many lives worth ?
Swift, Aggressive , Resource Heavy Initial Attack is the ONLY WAY to serve our public.
Once again, Sikorsky has convinced another unknowing Fire Agency/State that spending $24M for one aircraft and then spending another $4M per year to operate it makes sense….their marketing budget must be larger than many state budgets allow for fire suppression and or forest health initiatives! The Fire Hawks are all the rage right now, but I wonder how many of them will be on the secondary market in 3-4 years after these states and counties refuse to fund the operating costs…FANTASTIC aircraft, but so many other less costly contracting options out there…
Agree, it seems like contracting more helicopters would be the way to go for them. Spread out to provide more coverage, contract for maybe 180 days (or less, with option to extend). One new helicopter will not make much difference, when you could use the money to contract for a couple of type 1 ac. You would also only need a manager, not a whole crew to staff a full-time Blackhawk.
2 cents.
C’mon Colorado, you can do better! $24,000,000 would have bought a LOT (80+) of dozers, transports and operators!!!! What an asinine thing to do, spend that kind of $ on a single rotor! 🙄
Well said Guano….lots of better ways to deal with the problem for a lot less…Sikorsky doing a great job keeping the production line humming as they shift from military demand to “other” channels such as wildfire…
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