Air Spray Aviation Services, which operates Lockheed L-188 Electra “Longliner” air tankers and Turbo Commander 690 “Bird Dog” aircraft in Canada, has established a new United States headquarters at Chico, California. They announced yesterday that they have acquired a BAe-146 airliner which they will convert into an air tanker.
Currently Neptune Aviation operates two BAe-146 air tankers which were converted by the Prince Edward Island based Tronos Aviation. Minden Air Corporation has been working on converting a BAe-146 for at least a couple of years but their version has not yet dropped on a fire. Minden has a contract with the US Forest Service to supply two of them, one in 2012 and the second in 2013. Aero Flight has a contract to provide two Avro Rj85s in 2013, an aircraft that is a variant of the BAe-146.
The BAe-146 is considered a “next generation” air tanker by the US Forest Service. It is jet powered, can cruise at 498 mph, and the Tronos version has a maximum capacity of 3,000 gallons of retardant.
Air Tanker 466, a Dromader, at Hot Springs, SD, March 14, 2012. Photo by Bill Gabbert
In what is unprecedented in the state, six Single Engine Air Tankers (SEATs) are staged and available to help to fight wildfires in South Dakota this week. The aircraft are positioned at Pierre, Mobridge, Valentine, Hot Springs and two in Lemmon.
Part of the reason for the surge in the numbers of air tankers is the opening of pronghorn antelope season on Saturday.
There have been quite a few fires in western South Dakota this year and the SEATs have been busy.
One of the likely reasons that the US Forest Service refuses to offer an exclusive use contract for a Very Large Air Tanker such as Evergreen’s 747 or 10 Tanker Air Carrier’s DC-10 is the agency assumes they cost more than smaller “large” air tankers like the P2V or BAe-146 that have a capacity of 2,200 to 3,000 gallons. Rick Hatton, the president of 10 Tanker Air Carrier, is attempting to change that perception. The company has a very popular page on Facebook that has accumulated over 9,000 “likes”. Today they posted an infographic claiming their two DC-10s can deliver retardant at less than half the cost of a BAe-146; about $4 a gallon for a DC-10 versus about $8 a gallon for a BAe-146. These prices do not include the cost of the retardant itself, just the costs for getting the retardant to the fire. In September, 2010, the price of retardant on the Fourmile Fire near Denver was $1.97 a gallon.
DC-10 air tanker cost per gallon to deliver retardant. Credit: 10 Tanker Air Carrier. Used with permission. (click to enlarge)
There are many costs and variables that go into calculating the cost per gallon for delivering retardant, including daily availability rate for the air tanker, hourly rate, fuel costs, turnaround time for each aircraft, and retardant capacity of the air tanker.
Mr. Hatton told Wildfire Today that for their calculations they assumed a one hour turnaround time (very quick for a DC-10 which has to wait while 11,600 gallons of retardant are transferred into its tanks), a typical fuel burn, contract prices for fuel, both aircraft were on exclusive use contracts, and at least 11,600 gallons were delivered.
The most important variables are the daily and hourly rates for the air tanker. We asked Mr. Hatton what the rates are for his DC-10s and he did not answer. So it is impossible to verify his conclusions without knowing the costs for both aircraft.
According to the Billings Gazette, in 2012, the 50-year-old P2V air tankers, which can carry about 2,200 gallons, have an average daily availability rate of $10,000, plus an hourly flight rate of $5,750. The BAe-146 jets with a 3,000-gallon capacity have a daily availability rate of $23,500 and an hourly flight rate of $9,520.
The round-trip time for each air tanker to drop, reload, and drop again on the Fourmile fire was 0.55 hour. This is extremely quick and is due to the fact that the air tankers were reloading at Rocky Mountain Metropolitan Airport near Boulder, Jeffco air tanker base, about 15 air miles from the fire. This helped keep the cost per gallon of delivered retardant lower than on your typical fire, which is normally much more than 15 miles away from the reload base. Usually an air tanker spends at least 15-20 minutes on the ground, which includes landing, taxiing, refilling with retardant, taxiing again, and takeoff. If they have to refuel, it takes much longer. If as in Mr. Hatton’s calculations you assume a 1 hour turnaround time, it would have added approximately $1 a gallon to the costs on the Fourmile Canyon fire.
I am not saying that the cost of a delivered gallon of retardant is the most important factor in awarding or not awarding an exclusive use contract for an air tanker. You should also consider the age, safety, and dependability of the aircraft, as well as the exposure to risk –how many hours will be spent in the air flying low and slow over mountainous terrain in turbulent and smoky conditions. And, how many gallons can be delivered in a given length of time, to help achieve, working with firefighters on the ground, fast, aggressive initial attack on new fires with overwhelming force.
As William Scott said in his talk about wildfire arson and economic terrorism, the land management agencies “suffer from a culture and attitude of what firefighters call ‘cheapism’, the idea that we can fight wildland fire on the cheap. And that’s no longer acceptable.”
A California National Guard Blackhawk helicopter that was working on the Scotts Fire east of Ukiah, California (map) had to make a precautionary landing Friday, September 7 when a warning light came on. It set down on private land and was unable to be repaired on the site. It was not accessible to a flat bed truck that could haul it away so the National Guard brought in a Chinook helicopter which extracted the Blackhawk. The video of the operation was shot by John Jensen of Lake County News.
And speaking of the Scotts Fire, in case you missed the excellent video shot by Tim Walton that we posted on September 10, here it is again. It shows four different models of air tankers dropping retardant on the fire, an S-2T, DC-10, BAe-146, and a MAFFS C-130.
The Scotts Fire is 100 percent contained after burning 4,618 acres.
Tanker 911, a DC-10, drops on the Sheep Herder Hill Complex near Casper on Monday. Photo by Alan Rogers, Casper Star-Tribune. Used with permission. (click to enlarge)
This spectacular photo of Air Tanker 911, a DC-10, dropping on the Sheep Herder Hill Complex near Casper, Wyoming was taken by Alan Rogers of the Casper Star-Tribune yesterday. The photo, along with the video we posted on September 10, tends to disprove the assertions that the Very Large Air Tankers can only be used in “flat or gently-rolling terrain”.
The Casper Star-Tribune has several other photos of the interior of the DC-10 on their web site along with an article about the aircraft. We thank Mr. Rogers for allowing us to use this excellent photograph.
The fire, which became known as the Sheep Herder Hill Complex when a new fire started a couple of miles away Monday night, grew by about 600 acres on Tuesday to a total of 15,887 acres, according to Neal Kephart, a spokesperson for the fire. The Type 2 Incident Management Team led by Incident Commander Todd Pechota took over management of the new fire, named Elkhorn, and aggressively attacked it Monday and Tuesday with engines, aircraft, and smokejumpers, stopping the spread after it burned 8 acres.
Map of Sheep Herder Hill Complex, September 11, 2012. ESRI
Evacuations are still in effect for 150 homes, and another 800 are threatened, according to Mr. Kephart.
Firefighters are getting a break from the weather today, with a forecast for a high temperature of 67 degrees and a 7 to 9 mph wind out of the east and northeast. The relative humidity will bottom out at 21%.
The DC-10 and Tanker 40, a BAe-146, are still parked at the Casper airport 15 miles northeast of the fire along with 4 single engine air tankers, but as of 11:30 a.m. today had not been used yet today.
Other resources on the fire include 7 helicopters (4 large Type 1s, and 3 smaller Type 3s), 17 engines, 4 dozers, and 292 personnel. Two of the helicopters are from the National Guard.
Today, eleven years after the 9/11 attacks on the United States, we will pause for a minute to remember those firefighters and other citizens who lost their lives that day……………….
Next Generation legged robots
We first wrote about these “robot dogs” in 2009, and now DARPA has developed the next generation of these machines that are designed to “unburden dismounted [military] squad members by carrying their gear, autonomously following them through rugged terrain, and interpreting verbal and visual commands.”
I wonder how much water or fire hose these critters can carry?
Amazing air tanker photo
One of the best photos ever taken of an air tanker drop was taken by Kent Porter at the Scotts fire in northern California and can be found at the San Francisco Chronicle web site.
California fire protection fee
The San Francisco Chronicle also has an article that updates the situation in which California owners of habitable structures in areas where the state is responsible for fire prevention must pay a $150 fee. Lawsuits may be filed. Of course.
New map of all large fires this year
The Associated Press has an interesting map that supposedly shows all of the large fires that have occurred this year.
Atomic scientists weigh in on climate change and wildland fires
A publication titled Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists has published an article written by Max Moritz, of the Department of Environmental Science, Policy, and Management in the College of Natural Resources at University of California, Berkeley. (I wonder if all that fits on a business card?) Mr. Moritz writes about how climate change will affect wildland fires and the population. It does not exactly break new ground, with the recommendations being communities should be fire-resistant and we must learn to coexist again with wildfire.
