Bristow Photos

[Dave Ed]

Dominican Republic

Dominican Republic



I think I posted something about crop dusting Hillers a way back in the thread but as I'm working through the bases I will recap sometimes....forgive any repetition.....

In 1960, Sir Miles Wyatt asked Alan Bristow if he would like to take over the running of Fison Airwork and effectively merge it with Bristow Helicopters so although many of these operations were not strictly Bristow operations they were under Bristows control for a time and many staff joined the company.Therefore the general feeling is that Fison Airwork should be included as part of Bristow history.
Fison Airwork itself was formed from Airwork and Fison Pest Control and had many contracts in the field of crop spraying of which the Dominican Republic was one.

Occupying the eastern part of the island of Haiti, the Dominican Republic has an area of about 19,000 square miles. It lies within the tropics but the heat is tempered by sea breezes, its northern shore being washed by the Atlantic Ocean and its southern by the Carribean Sea. At the time of the Fison-Airworks contracts agriculture was the most important industry with most crops needing some form of pest control.


Dated at July 1962, what looks like a rotors running refuel and insecticide upload.





Same date. "Spraying bananas using a Hiller 12C."






and thanks to John Odlin for the following pictures. John is the pilot in the Hiller and at twenty something learnt a lot about flying helicopters on the crop dusting circuit.