I understand that the weather in the blue mountains last week was blustery, with reports from those on ground of the wind suddenly gusting, veering or abating.
This is not unusual on a bad fire day. There was a report that at one point helicopters stopped working as bambi buckets were being adversely affected by the wind.
Is it possible to compare the airframe stresses of the fixed wing fire bombing low level flights over rugged terrain in blustery weather to normal ops in the ag role?
Is it likely that a patch of very severe turbulence was encountered that would have taken down any light aircraft?
Mickjoebill