As you probably know, a C-130 aircraft outfitted temporarily so that it could function as an air tanker, crashed on Sunday while it was helping to suppress a wildfire near Edgemont, South Dakota, killing four and injuring two crew members. The plane belonged to the North Carolina National Guard and was based at Charlotte, North Carolina. I have family in Charlotte and they tell me that this is a big news story in their town. The four victims lived in the Charlotte metro area and the accident has received heavy coverage in the Charlotte Observer. An article about the crash today shared the front page with an excellent appreciation of the recently departed and much-beloved Andy Griffith, another North Carolinian.
Here is an excerpt from the article about the C-130 crash, from the eyes of a resident of Edgemont, SD:
…In South Dakota, Dave Augustine said he saw a plane fly into the smoke of the fire.
“What seemed like the time he should have come up, the fire really got with it,” said Augustine, 68. “I never saw that airplane again.”
Augustine was watching the blaze with binoculars from his home about seven miles away in Edgemont, S.D. It was Sunday evening about the same time the C-130 from Charlotte crashed while spreading fire retardant in advance of the inferno.
“I couldn’t say whether it was the same plane, but I wasn’t surprised when I heard about the crash,” he said.
Seconds after the plane disappeared into the smoke, the fire suddenly seemed to intensify, he said. A plume of black smoke rose straight up from the gray smoke he had been observing for days.
“All that smoke came up right afterward,” Augustine said. “About that time I could see flashes of trees really lighting up. It was the biggest smoke I saw. It looked like something had happened.”
Winds seemed intense at the time, he said. He had been observing the fire, which has ravaged about 5,000 acres in southwestern South Dakota, since Friday. Blown by wind gusts, the fire moved about five miles on its first day.
The North Carolina National Guard has released the names of the C-130 crewmembers who were killed when their MAFFS air tanker crashed in South Dakota on Sunday.
Dead are Lt. Col. Paul K. Mikeal, 42, of Mooresville, N.C.; Maj. Joseph M. McCormick, 36, of Belmont, N.C.; Maj. Ryan S. David, 35, of Boone, N.C.; Senior Master Sgt. Robert S. Cannon, 50, of Charlotte.
“Words can’t express how much we feel the loss of these airmen,” said Brig. Gen. Tony McMillan, 145 AW commander. “Our prayers are with their families, as well as our injured brothers as they recover.”
Mikeal was assigned to the 156th Airlift Squadron as an evaluator pilot and had more than 20 years of service. He leaves behind a wife and two children.
McCormick was an instructor pilot and chief of training for the 156th Airlift Squadron. He was married with four children.
David was an experienced navigator and was also assigned to the 156th. He joined the North Carolina Air National Guard in 2011 after prior service in the active-duty U.S. Air Force. He is survived by his wife and one child.
Cannon had more than 29 years with the Charlotte unit and was a flight engineer with the 145th Operations Support Flight. He was married with two children.
The names of the injured will not be released. Both of the injured airmen remain hospitalized.
The crew and its aircraft along with two other 145th C-130s and three dozen airmen flew from Charlotte to Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado Springs, Colo., Saturday to assist with fighting forest fires in the Rocky Mountain region. They were due to move to a base in Cheyenne, Wyoming on Monday. The crash occurred around 6:30 p.m. MT near Edgemont, South Dakota as the crew was dropping retardant on the White Draw fire. The cause of the crash is unknown and is under investigation.
MAFFS 7 departs North Carolina June 30, 2012 for Peterson AFB. Photo by Tech Sgt Brian Christiansen
The United States Northern Command and the U.S. Forest Service have released more information about yesterday’s South Dakota crash of a C-130 aircraft outfitted with a Modular Airborne FireFighting System (MAFFS), enabling it to function as an air tanker.
The USFS said there were two survivors and four fatalities. Yesterday Black Hills FOX News reported that the two survivors were picked up by helicopter from the crash site and flown to the Custer airport. From there one was flown by a life flight helicopter to a hospital in Rapid City and the other went by ground ambulance to the hospital.
The C-130 was identified as MAFFS #7 from the North Carolina Air National Guard’s 145th Airlift Wing based at Charlotte-Douglas International Airport and was working on the White Draw Fire about five miles northeast of Edgemont in the southwest corner of South Dakota. The accident, which occurred at 6:00 or 6:30 p.m. MT, is, of course, being investigated, and the cause has not been released, but the USFS provided some information:
A BLM ASM [Aerial Supervision Module] platform was also engaged as a lead [plane] with the C130 when the accident occurred. The ASM/Lead experienced a severe downdraft while approaching the intended retardant drop zone with the C130 in trail. This is being investigated by the USFS as a separate Incident With Potential.
As sometimes happens after an aircraft accident, the remaining seven MAFFS-equipped C-130s are on an operational hold. The fleet will spend the day to get the MAFFS crews together to “reflect, reset and review,” said Col. Jerry Champlin, 153rd Air Expeditionary Group commander. “We all need to make sure our crews and planes will be ready to re-engage in the mission safely,” he added.
I searched some air tanker accident files, and was not able to find any record of fatal crashes of military-operated MAFFS air tankers, which were created after the record-breaking 1970 fire season.
The White Draw fire has burned 4,200 acres and is 30% contained. Monday morning there was so much wildfire smoke over a large portion of southwest South Dakota that two CV-580 air tankers on loan from Canada were not able to execute a request to drop retardant on the Parker Peak fire, a new fire about two miles east of the White Draw fire. They had to return to Rapid City and jettison the retardant before landing.
On Sunday, in addition to dropping on the White Draw fire, MAFFS air tankers were also working on the Oil Creek fire near Newcastle, WY, 39 miles northwest of the White Draw fire.
MAFFS #7 was one of four MAFFS ships scheduled to relocate on Monday from Peterson Air Force base at Colorado Springs to Wyoming Air National Guard’s base in Cheyenne, in order to reduce the turn-around time for reloading with retardant while working the fires in Wyoming and South Dakota.
The video below shows some of the operations at the Custer airport related to the accident.
(The video is no longer available.)
The one-minute video below includes Black Hills Fox’s Sunday night coverage of the crash.
(The video is no longer available.)
Our sincere condolences go out to the families and other members of the North Carolina Air National Guard.
A MAFFS C-130 air tanker at Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado Springs, June 27, 2012. Photo by Staff Sgt Stephany Richards
(We have updated information on the incident HERE, July 2, 2012.)
A C-130 military air tanker air tanker *”went down” in South Dakota late Sunday afternoon. Fox News and the Rapid City Journal are reporting that two or three survived — reports differ about the number. The incident was confirmed by Pat Cross, a spokesperson for the Incident Management Team assigned to the White Draw fire northeast of Edgemont, South Dakota. It is believed that the air tanker had been working on that fire.
A helicopter was able to land near the site and fly the injured crewmembers to Custer. From there they were transported to Rapid City Regional Hospital for further medical treatment, the Sheriff’s Office said.
The C-130 usually carries a crew of six. The additional members of the crew are unaccounted for.
The aircraft was outfitted with a Modular Airborne FireFighting System (MAFFS) in the cargo hold which enables it to operate as an air tanker, carrying up to 3,000 gallons of fire retardant. It was one of eight that have been activated over the last week to help suppress the numerous fires in the western United States.
*(Note: we used the term “went down” because that or “gone down” is the phrase that was used in the early reports, including those from the Fall River County Sheriff’s Office and the Great Plains Dispatch Center in Rapid City. We don’t know the circumstances, and there is a report that it occurred several miles from the White Draw fire.)
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We want to thank the numerous people who reported this to us in comments on other articles and directly over the phone. This notice would have gone up sooner, but we were out in the field covering the Highland and Oil Creek fires.
Sightings of a meteor grounded the air tankers working on the Springer fire west of Colorado Springs on Wednesday. There were numerous reports of the meteor from New Mexico, Colorado, and Kansas including the pilot of an air tanker making a drop on the fire. The Associated Press quoted Steve Segin, a spokesperson for the Springer fire, as saying the air tanker “landed as they normally do to reload, and for safety reasons they grounded themselves until they could figure out what it was they saw”.
A TV station in Denver, 7News, reported:
The Rocky Mountain Area Coordination Center said planes were grounded after the reports started coming in just after 2:30 p.m.
It was determined that the object was a meteor that broke up in the air over Kansas on a trajectory that would carry it to Florida.
None of the debris hit the ground in Colorado.
Aircraft were released to resume flying at 4 p.m., the Fire Coordination Center said.
This may be the first time that firefighting aircraft were grounded because of a meteor.
It is difficult to tell, when observing a meteor that is falling thousands of miles an hour, how far away it is. There were several reports from people in Colorado who thought it was nearby, but it was actually hundreds of miles away and there were no indications that any portions of it hit the earth. After grounding the air tankers for 90 minutes, let’s not even call this a near miss.
Wildland firefighter dies in Greece
The Associated Press is reporting that a firefighter working on a wildfire in Greece died Wednesday. A fire department spokesperson said the 28-year old felt unwell and was taken to a hospital where he was pronounced dead. The firefighter was battling a fire that was burning inside an air force base west of Athens primarily used by firefighting and transport planes.
Our sincere condolences go out to the firefighter’s family and coworkers.
Escaped prescribed fire in North Carolina burns 21,000 acres
A prescribed fire on the Croatan National Forest that escaped on Father’s Day, named the “Dad Fire”, has now burned over 21,000 acres ten miles south of New Bern, North Carolina. The fire is 60 percent contained and has run up costs of $400,000. Smoke from the fire is causing problems for some residents and air quality alerts have been issued for 12 counties.
Congressman Walter B. Jones, R-N.C., called for an investigation Tuesday.
“Our No. 1 priority is to get the fire contained,” said Jones, in a news release. “However, I share the concerns of many Eastern North Carolinians as to how this poorly planned ‘prescribed burn’ is negatively affecting tourism, public health and taxpayers who are being asked to pick up the tab to fight a fire that could have been avoided.”
District Ranger Pancho Smith says even though some prescribed fires do turn into wildfires like this one, he does not regret conducting them.
“One of the big advantages in this country of controlled burns, and on national forest systems across the country, is the reduction of fuel on the forest floor. If we leave it out, when we do get a fire start, a wildfire, there’s nothing we can do about it,” said Smith.
The fire is being managed by Cherry’s Type 3 Incident Management Team.
Texas Forest Service receives Pulaski Award
Congratulations to the Texas Forest Service. Following is the text from a news release:
June 21, 2012 – COLLEGE STATION, Texas – Texas Forest Service was presented last week with the Pulaski Award, a national honor for outstanding service in wildland firefighting.
The award, commending the agency for its response during the 2011 wildfire season, is presented annually by the National Interagency Fire Center. It was announced at the Southern Group of State Foresters annual conference in Louisville, Ky.
The coveted 30-inch bronze statue is named after U.S. Forest Service Ranger Ed Pulaski, who led a crew to safety during the Great Fire of 1910. First presented in 1998, this is the first time the Pulaski Award has come to Texas. It will stay with Texas Forest Service for one year then will be shipped to the next recipient.
Texas Forest Service Associate Director Mark Stanford said the recognition is an honor for the emergency responders who bravely served Texas during last year’s unprecedented wildfire season. More than 30,000 wildfires burned almost 4 million acres, destroying 2,946 homes across the state.
The wildfires were suppressed with assistance from more than 16,000 emergency responders from all 50 states, along with 239 dozers, 954 engines and 246 aircraft.
“We accept this award on behalf of all the local, state and interagency firefighters who participated in the 2011 wildfire season,” Stanford said. “They’re the ones who really earned this award.”
Gary Bowers, chairman of the National Interagency Fire Center Governing Board, wrote in a letter to Texas Forest Service that the agency demonstrated “exceptional work in interagency cooperation and coordination, safety of their firefighters and the public, the development of partnerships and group performance in fire management and suppression.”
“It is our hope that collaboration efforts such as this will increasingly inspire and inform new cooperative efforts across the country,” Bowers wrote. “Congratulations on this award and the excellent work that it recognizes.”
The NTSB has released a two-paragraph statement about the accident in which air tanker pilots Todd Tompkins and Ron Chambless were killed. The P2V went down June 3 while they were helping to suppress the White Rock fire in Utah. Here is the complete text of the statement.
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NTSB Identification: WPR12GA243
Nonscheduled 14 CFR Public Use
Accident occurred Sunday, June 03, 2012 in Modena, UT
Aircraft: LOCKHEED P2V-7, registration: N14447
Injuries: 2 Fatal.
This is preliminary information, subject to change, and may contain errors. Any errors in this report will be corrected when the final report has been completed.
On June 3, 2012, at 1347 mountain daylight time, a Lockheed P2V-7, N14447 (using call sign Tanker 11), collided with mountainous terrain while conducting firefighting operations 20 miles north of Modena, Utah. The airplane was operated by Neptune Aviation Services under contract with the US Forest Service as a public aerial firefighting flight. Both pilots were fatally injured. The airplane was substantially damaged by impact forces and a post crash fire. Visual meteorological conditions prevailed, and a company flight plan had been filed. The flight originated in Cedar City, Utah, at 1315.
While conducting its second retardant drop of the day, Tanker 11 followed behind the lead airplane into the drop zone. The drop zone was located in a shallow valley that was 0.4 miles wide and 350 feet deep. The lead airplane flew a shallow right-hand turn on to final, and dropped to an altitude of 150 feet above the valley floor over the intended drop area. While making the right turn on to final behind the lead plane, Tanker 11 impacted rising terrain that was about 700 feet left of the lead airplane’s flight path.
(end of NTSB statement)
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There had been conflicting reports in the media about whether Tanker 11 crashed before, during, or after it dropped a load of retardant. This statement from the NTSB indicates that the aircraft crashed before it reached the intended drop area, but does not specify if the retardant was jettisoned, as might be done if the aircraft was experiencing difficulties. As usual in these investigations, it will be many months, or years, before the NTSB releases their final report.
