Interesting article on aerial fire-fighting inc. video of DC-10 doing drop
 

Watched something like the CL 415 (well, it was yellow anyway ;)) operating off a lake near Marbella a few years ago. Impressive.

Vid clip linky
 

I wonder if the Rusky job has ejection seats fitted ??
Some US Neptunes did, although you need one hand on the lower handle if the main spar breaks at "Woop Woop" height, plus good tree climbing gear!

The Hercules + MAFFS2 system has had a lot of action in this field:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modula...ighting_System

What is ridiculous is that the threat in the northern hemisphere happens six month out of phase with that in the southern hemisphere, and I don't reckon the gear is being moved around the globe accordingly.

When the spring/autumn comes, there should be a conference of forest fire fighting authorities to work out a system.

The Cinderella system, choppers + bambi baskets, (where did this cute name come from?) may well be more precise, and should be brought into this conference.

Here is another DC-10 firefighting article - it is mostly an assembly of videos.

Watching This DC-10 Fire Retardant Drop Run Will Make You Queasy

Have watched amphibians, (not sure of type) scooping up sea water to drop on forest fires in Croatia.
Seemed very effective

Talking of MAFFS, some of the crew shot some amazing video whilst fighting the Rim Fire in California in 2013. Gives you a really feel for the scale of the fires that have been occurring in West Coast USA and Australia in recent years.
This is a nice film of them following the spotter in along the rim of the Tuolumne valley for a drop against a back ground wall of pyrocumulus clouds

Almost certainly the CL415.

Extremely sturdy and very docile planes they are. They can manoeuver at 70-75kts without stalling.

A few of their piston-engined predecessors (the 215) used to be based at the airport I live within spitting distance of (PSR/LIBP) and I've had the opportunity to spend a quite enjoyable afternoon getting a tour of one of these as it was being overhauled.

Some stats on the US Forest Service fleet:

Summary of air tanker use, 2014 | Fire Aviation

Projected federal air tanker fleet for the United States | Fire Aviation

USFS has 34 large air tankers currently activated | Fire Aviation

Individual states also have their own, e.g.:

http://www.fire.ca.gov/communication...onOverview.pdf

http://www.fire.ca.gov/communication...webbooklet.pdf

Aviation Program | WA - DNR

Conair has a large fleet. I imagine they are doing pretty well this year:
Fleet | Conair Aerial Firefighting

Had the pleasure of training the Aero-flite/connair Avro RJ guys over the last couple of years.
Top guys and a new job for the old RJ.

Test drop:
https://youtu.be/jpE2O13BiA0

Photo from a friend of the family currently documenting and fighting the fires in Washington state, USA.

DC-10 pilot demonstrating impressive drop skills.
http://i57.tinypic.com/2v2fij5.jpg

Although the fires are on the other side of the Cascade mountain range, air quality around here the last few days has been pretty bad, and this morning after I got up, I briefly went looking for the source of the "smoke" I was smelling, before realizing where it was likely coming from :rolleyes:.

A couple years ago I was in Colorado working on the old family home when they had big fires - one ~60 miles north outside Colorado Springs, the other ~45 miles west at the Royal Gorge. With the normal wind pattern being from the west or northwest, air quality was really bad...

One of the DC-10 tankers was being used against the Royal Gorge fire, operating out of the Pueblo Airport. The airport is ~5 miles due east of my house (when I was a teen, before they built up other houses around it, we could easily see the airport and watch the airport operations from our back windows). With the main runway pointed east/west, a westerly takeoff was almost directly at the Royal Gorge fire roughly 50 miles away. They weren't bothering to climb much after takeoff, going over the house at incredibly low altitudes (and really, really loud - and this was compared to my teen years of watching and listening to countless 727s go overhead when United did pilot training there). At one point, the guy that was doing tile work for me was out back cutting some tiles when the DC-10 taking off passed overhead. He came inside and pronounced he could tell me exactly how many rivets there were in the bottom of a DC-10 wing as he'd just counted them :E.

I don't know how much those air-tanker pilots get paid, but they certainly earn it.:ok:

After a controlled burn, and during a fire in Big Sur to our south, the sunsets were quite spectacular. Have you noticed any of this sort, TD?

Amen to that. Those gents, and the fire jumpers!

Bushfire fighting
 

As it happens the first C130 water bomber arrived in Australia this week, to be followed by bae 146 and i believe DC 10 bombers later.

There are teams from Australia and N.Z. helping out in North America now and they send crews south in our summer.

slf.au says:
"As it happens the first C130 water bomber arrived in Australia this week, to be followed by bae 146 and i believe DC 10 bombers later".

All the gear in he northern hemisphere should be on move down south. Spain, France has forest fire fighting stuff. The UK as well. In fact, this would be a good time for an International meeting to discuss optimising the positioning of this type of gear. (Also, for that matter, snow ploughs. In the UK, we get fed up with roads closing in response to a few inches of snow. A "Ploughs for Maffs" exchange? - and swap back in the spring).

Technically, that's an L382, not a C-130. ;)

http://skiesmag.com/digital_issue/20...2/files/1.html

Canada (I mean..cough...Canadian Companies) regularly sends equip. down to Oz, in addition to a good batch of the firefighters themselves. It all depends on the equip though - It's not really practical to try and ferry BC's/Conair's Air Tractors all the way down! By the time they got there the season would be over! In the past there's been Canadian Electras and such down there as well.
The 215/415 is a beauty firefighting aircraft but the Provinces (those who own/operate their own equipment and don't contract) here tend to keep a really tight grip on 'em. Like most expensive things purchased with public moolah - they are treated so accordingly.

There is significant exchange regarding personnel. My outfit has done quite a few forestry/firefighting charters as well with Australian firefighters this season up here in Canader.

There is cooperation. It's not always visible. It certainly is audible though when a host of 'Sheilas' and 'Bruces' show up in your small northern town!

A Squared says:

Quote:
Originally Posted by slf.au http://www.pprune.org/images/buttons/viewpost.gif
As it happens the first C130 water bomber arrived in Australia this week,

Technically, that's an L382, not a C-130. ;)

Maybe. But I am pretty sure that certain marks of C-130 can be fitted with the MAFFS or MAFFS2 kit and then become water bombers. (The water comes out of the paratroops' jump doors). I don't know the cost of this add-on, but it must make pressing some Hercules into water bombing as needed relatively cheap.

That's also not a MAFFS or MAFFS 2 system. It's a completely different tank and drop system developed by Coulson. It can be installed in C-130's, and in fact has been installed in a C-130, but it requires fairly extensive airframe modifications.

The MAFFS can be installed in any Herc without extensive modification.