Lead plane 6-5 and Tanker 45, a P2V, on the Whoopup fire near Newcastle, WY, July 18, 2011. Photo by Bill Gabbert
The inspections that the Federal Aviation Administration required within 24 hours of receiving their Emergency Airworthiness Directive (EAD), cleared the other ten P2V air tankers. Yesterday we reported that after a 24-inch crack was found in a wing spar and skin on one of Neptune Aviation’s P2V-7 air tankers the FAA issued the directive requiring that all P2V aircraft be inspected. The EAD said:
This condition, if not detected and corrected, could result in significant loss of structural integrity of the wing.
The NTSB investigation found that the Hawkins and Powers C-130A air tanker that crashed on June 17, 2002 near Walker, California when the wings fell off, had a series of fatigue cracks in the skin panel of the right wing which grew together to become 12-inches long.
The Missoulian has more information about the results of this week’s inspections:
“We had one aircraft with significant cracking,” Neptune president Dan Snyder said Wednesday. “But is this another Aero Union situation, where we have zero tankers for the fire season? No. The tankers will be back up.
We cut pieces out of the aircraft, but we still don’t know what caused it.””
Mr. Snyder was referring to the cancellation of the U.S. Forest Service’s contract with Aero Union’s eight P3 Orion air tankers over a safety inspection issue. This reduced the fleet from 19 air tankers at the beginning of the 2011 fire season to 11. Aero Union then shut down and is auctioning their air tankers and other assets. In 2002 there were 44 large air tankers on USFS contracts.
More from the Missoulian:
Nevada-based Minden Air Corp. provides two more P2-Vs for Forest Service firefighting. In a statement, Minden CEO Leonard Parker said none of his planes were affected, and the company expected to have its first P2-V available for Forest Service action on Feb. 15.
This incident pointed out that since all eleven of the air tankers on U.S. Forest Service standard exclusive use contracts are the same model, P2V, a safety issue has the potential to ground the entire fleet of USFS large air tankers. One additional air tanker not affected is the jet-powered BAe-146 which is being operated by Neptune under a temporary “interim” approval from the Interagency Air Tanker Board. After a year of testing it was granted “interim” approval status last fall and is being considered for full approval.
The Federal Aviation Administration has issued an Emergency Airworthiness Directive (EAD) that requires inspections of P2V aircraft after a large crack was found in a wing spar and skin on one of Neptune Aviation’s P2V-7 air tankers. The EAD, intended for the owners and operators of Lockheed P2V aircraft, says the 24-inch crack propagated through the wing front spar web, lower chord, and wing lower skin. The FAA is requiring “a detailed inspection for cracks, working fasteners, and other anomalies, including surface damage in the form of a nick, gouge, or corrosion; and repairing if necessary.”
We talked with a spokesperson for the FAA who told us that their agency does not “ground” aircraft, however the Emergency Airworthiness Directive requires that inspections of the P2V air tankers be completed within one day of the operators receiving the notification. Then they must report to the FAA the findings, positive or negative, of the inspections.
We will update this article when we have more information.
This affects all of the large air tankers that are under a standard U.S. Forest Service exclusive use contract. All 11 of them are P2Vs — nine operated by Neptune and two by Minden. In 2002 there were 44 large air tankers on USFS contracts.
One additional air tanker not affected is the jet-powered BAe-146 which is being flown by Neptune under temporary “interim” approval from the Interagency Air Tanker Board. After a year of testing it was granted “interim” approval status last fall and is being considered for full approval. The last we heard it was out of service and undergoing a major scheduled maintenance at the Tronos facility on Prince Edward Island in Canada. Minden also has a BAe-146 under development and is hoping to have it flying over fires this fire season.
The USFS cancelled Aero Union’s contract for their eight P3 air tankers last summer, saying the company did not complete some required inspections. The P3 air tankers are not affected by this FAA directive, but Aero Union has closed their doors and is auctioning their air tankers and other assets this month.
The remaining USFS-contracted air tankers were scheduled to come on earlier than usual this year. One of Minden’s P2Vs is scheduled to start on February 15, and the agency asked Neptune to have their first aircraft mission-ready by February 26. Three more airtankers are scheduled to begin their Mandatory Availability Periods (MAP) in March (one Minden, two Neptune), two are scheduled to begin their MAPs in April, and four are scheduled to come on board in May.
Rick Hatton, the President and CEO of 10 Tanker Air Carrier was not offered an exclusive use contract for their two DC-10 Very Large Air Tankers by the U.S. Forest Service, and only has a call when needed contract with the agency. The DC-10s carry 11,600 gallons, about four times the capacity of a standard large air tanker. Mr. Hatton told Wildfire Today this morning:
We did some good work with the 10s in 2011 in 6 states plus Canada. With over 420 missions on over 70 fires, we are hopeful of being awarded a multiple aircraft contract in 2012. Two are ready for that, and we can add one every 6 months if contracted. The 10 can do the work of 4+ alternative aircraft, and can really fill a big part of the fleet needed now and in future years.
The USFS has put all of their eggs into one basket, with all 11 of their contracted air tankers being the same model, except for the BAe-146 which has interim approval. This is not the first time that all aircraft of the same model have been grounded. The agency could have seen this coming and should have been prepared. Since the two fatal crashes in 2002 which permanently grounded several models of ancient air tankers, the USFS has had 10 years to rebuild the aging fleet, but sat on their hands watching the fleet decay from 44 air tankers to 11, as they were hampered by indecision and analysis paralysis.
Have the chickens come home to roost? Maybe the 24-inch cracks found in the 50+ year old P2V can be easily fixed, and perhaps the other 10 P2Vs will get a clean bill of health — until the next crash or Emergency Airworthiness Directive. Or, the worst case scenario is that an analysis will determine that a weakness has been discovered that, for safety reasons, will permanently ground all P2V air tankers, reducing the fleet to one air tanker on “interim” approval status.
We all know that 50-60 year old aircraft are going to have more safety and maintenance issues than more modern aircraft. The USFS’ request for proposal for “next generation” turbine-powered air tankers is a step in the right direction, but we didn’t see anything in the RFP that required WHICH generation they belong to, or that they be, for example, less than 20 years old. Jennifer Jones, a spokesperson for the USFS told us today that they expect to award the first of these next-gen contracts in April of this year. In addition, Ms. Jones told us:
Until we are notified otherwise by the vendors, we expect the [P2V] airtankers to be available at the start of their mandatory availability periods. The U.S. Forest Service is committed to modernizing the Large Airtanker Fleet. The agency is currently developing a strategy to improve and modernize the fleet.
The Hawkins and Powers C-130A air tanker that crashed on June 17, 2002 near Walker, California when the wings fell off, had a series of fatigue cracks in the skin panel of the right wing which grew together to become 12-inches long and were found to have propagated past the area where they would have been covered by the doubler and into the stringers beneath the doubler and across the lap joint between the middle skin panel and the forward skin panel.
Neptune Aviation and Minden Air Corp have been asked by the U.S. Forest Service to have their air tankers available three to four weeks earlier than last year. We first reported on this here and here.
Below is an excerpt from a news release about how it affects Neptune.
Neptune Aviation Accelerates Air Tanker Readiness For Predicted Early 2012 Wildland Fire Season
Neptune Aviation, the largest US private operator of fixed wing aerial tankers, is gearing up for the 2012 fire season through an accelerated maintenance and training program, given predictions of earlier than normal wildland fire out-breaks–particularly in portions of the US Southwest.
“The US Forest Service approached us last fall, and asked that we have our aircraft available early,” said Dan Snyder, President of the Missoula-based company. “To meet our customer’s requirement, we commenced our fleet maintenance about a month early in preparation for the fire season. To do that, we leased additional hangar space at Missoula International Airport, and increased our contract maintenance staff to 30–up from the 10-15 we have employed in prior years. The contract staff supplements the 70 mechanics we employ full-time.”
Snyder noted that in a typical year, the contract maintenance staff, which includes airframe mechanics, electricians and sheet metal technicians, is on site from November through March, with the total cadre in place by January. “But, this year, we ramped up to a full staff of 30 in October, and we expect that they will be here through April, so we’re taking on more people for a longer time period,” he said.
The contract maintenance staff will focus exclusively on the company’s nine active P2V Neptune tankers. As Snyder explained, Neptune Aviation is also deploying a single BAE 146 regional jet, modified for aerial tanker duty. The aircraft has operated since October 2011, under Interagency Airtanker Board interim approval. Given the capacity constraints generated by the accelerated preparation schedule, maintenance on the BAE 146 has being outsourced to Tronos, the company which partnered with Neptune on the tanker modification.
Pilot recurrent training has also been moved up by a month, starting January 1st. Neptune currently has 25 pilots, of which five are qualified on the BAE 146.
The earlier resumption of maintenance activity, and pilot training, reported Snyder, will enable Neptune Aviation to make the first aircraft mission-ready by February 26, with the last ones available no later than May 25.
“In 2011, availability of the first aircraft, by contract with the Forest Service, was March 18, with the last one ready for dispatch by June 25,” he pointed out, adding that the longer availability time-frame will mean more time in the field for pilots, mechanics, and support vehicle drivers. Because of this, the company plans to hire additional staff in order to assure those on the line their regular periods of time off.
“Neptune Aviation was well-prepared to meet the Forest Service’s request for early aircraft availability because of changes made in our operations over the past three years,” Snyder said. “We were positioned to respond to our customers’ requests in a timely fashion, and we are on track to do that.” Thanks go out to Dick
An artist's conception of Conair's British Aerospace Avro RJ85 air tanker. Image from Conair.
A Canadian air tanker company, Conair, has announced that they have purchased a jet-powered airliner and will be converting it into a Type 1 3,000-gallon air tanker. The aircraft is an Avro RJ85, which is a variant of a British Aerospace BAe-146. The difference is that the RJ85 has a longer fuselage and more efficient engines. The RJ85 seats up to 112 passengers as an airliner. Neptune leased a converted BAe-146 from Tronos and obtained “interim” approval from the Interagency Air Tanker Board in late 2011. In November and December it saw some limited use in Texas and California.
Judging from the artist’s conception of the planned air tanker conversion, it will have an internal tank, rather than a bolt-on external tank. Conair will be doing the actual conversion at their base at Abbotsford in British Columbia, Canada, but they have not announced if it will have a conventional constant-flow gravity tank or a pressurized tank. They expect to have the new 3,000-gallon air tanker ready for the 2013 fire season.
The RJ85 that Conair purchased in December is serial number E2270. It was previously operated by Lufthansa and was delivered in December, 1995. Here is a link to photos of the aircraft when it was flying for Lufthansa.
Below is an excerpt from a Conair news release:
We have undertaken a detailed evaluation of both the BAe 146 and Avro RJ85 including simulator and flight testing of the aircraft in the demanding low-level profile required in fire-fighting missions. It is important to note that we are working closely with BAE Systems as the Original Equipment Manufacturer. As a later variant of the BAe 146, the Avro RJ85 is a younger aircraft which will give longer life, and with its higher design weights and better ‘hot and high’ performance it will be a more suitable aircraft for these demanding missions.
With the improved performance of the RJ85 coupled with what we believe to be a game-changing tank design, the RJ85 Airtanker will offer a significant improved mission capability compared to existing, new and proposed aircraft including the BAe 146-200.
Conair operates a boatload of air tankers, including 10 CV580s and 17 single engine air tankers. Several of their CV580 air tankers saw service in the United States during the last part of the 2011 fire season after the U.S. Forest Service cancelled Aero Union’s contract for their eight P3 air tankers over a dispute about inspections.
The number of unfilled orders for large air tankers increased to 29.8 percent in 2011, while the number of air tankers that were available on contract fell. In 2010 there were 19 large air tankers on exclusive use contracts and the unable to fill (UTF) rate was 15 percent.
The higher UTF rate is at least partially due to a busy fire season in the southwest, compared to the slower years of 2009 and 2010. The number of acres burned in the lower 49 states in 2011, which excludes Alaska, was 8.4 million, exceeding the average of 5.1 million between 2000 and 2011.
Acres burned in wildfires in lower 49 states, US 2000-2011. Data from NIFC.
While the data about UTF rates is difficult to interpret, perhaps we can be safe in saying that if more than 4,000,000 acres burn in the lower 49 states, having 21 or fewer large air tankers tends to result in 25-30% of the air tanker orders being UTF, which is about triple the UTF rate when fewer acres burn. In 2000 with 40 air tankers on contract, 6,600,000 acres burned, and the UTF rate was 7%.
You have to wonder how often incident commanders do not place orders for needed air tankers if they already know that none are available.
UPDATE at 9:00 p.m. MT, January 25, 2012:
We received an email from Scott and we asked him if we could post what he wrote. Here it is:
You wrote “You have to wonder how often incident commanders do not place orders for needed air tankers if they already know that none are available.” This statement is hauntingly similiar to those found in John McLean’s “Fire on the Mountain”, where the author reported airtankers were not ordered during early phase of South Canyon Fire because of assumption “none were available”. The Lesson Learned was don’t assume. Place the orders, justify the need, and push for priority. Still may not get AT, but you tried. Obviously, the reduction in total number AT is ominous for the future. Thanks for keeping it on the front burner.
Here is a video that I ran across on AerialFirefighting.com’s Facebook page. It features CL-215/415s fighting fire from the air. I’m guessing it was shot in Spain or Portugal. The crews on those scoopers seem to enjoy their jobs!
The description on YouTube:
Video del 43 grupo “hecho a mano”. Demuestran lo divertidos que son cuando hace falta.
The description in English, according to Google Translate:
Video of 43 group “handmade”. They show how funny they are when needed.
Don’t be thrown off by the first 55 seconds. It really is about aerial firefighting.
