Safety ?s Cut 33 Planes From Nation's Tanker Fleet As Fire Season Starts

"Safety and maintenance lapses caused the U.S. government Monday to cancel contracts for 33 of its largest firefighting airtankers -- including five in Oregon -- on the brink of what could become a red-hot wildfire season.

It eliminates the aging stalwarts of an airborne firefighting fleet known for draping thousands of gallons of fire retardant over blazes across the West and leaves smaller single-engine airplanes and helicopters to fill in the gaps. The aging planes include the DC-4, DC-7 and P-3.

Two of the planes were based at the Redmond Air Center. Last summer the planes battled fires that burned nearly 100,000 acres of national forest west of Sisters. The center will be assigned other aircraft, but they may not travel as fast or carry as much retardant as the large tankers, said manager Dan Torrence.

EDIT

The decision to drop the privately owned tankers from the federal payroll followed a scathing report by the National Transportation Safety Board that last month said the U.S. Forest Service and Department of Interior lack expertise to ensure a safe air fleet. The report responded to the crash of three tankers since 1994, including two in 2002, that occurred when wings broke off in flight. The government stopped using C-130 air tankers following the fatal crashes. Monday's order drops most remaining two-engine tankers that were among the most visible and costly part of the annual federal firefighting campaign. Last year's tab for the tankers was roughly $30 million."

EDIT

Sure, it's inherently dangerous, but wings becoming detached during normal flight is ridiculous. They can take those millions and lease more helicopters, maybe that will help nip smaller fires before they spread.

cause forest fires. And air pollution. Depending on which Republican moran you believe.

Except that there are wackos on both sides who have ludicrous ideas about what constitutes proper forest management practices.

See if you can figure out which side we should err on.

Someone needs to write an environmental history of world empires. About how the Romans fields began to wash away from overcutting, and how you can measure this in the layers of silt deposits in rivers throughout Gaul. About how India, Sicily and Ethiopia used to be the richest lands on the planet, until short-sighted leaders overfarmed, overcut and over-polluted. About how the Sahara Desert used to be lush greenland with lakes and rivers.

See, first you overcut. Then you start losing topsoil. Then nothing grows. Then the rivers and lakes begin to fill. Then all the dams and irrigation and water treatment plants begin siphoning off more and more of the diminishing water supply. When a large lake dries up, not only is the drinking and irrigation water gone, but the heatsink value is gone, too, so lands get hotter and dryer in the summer, and colder at nights and in the winter. Soon you have a desert.

In the Aral Sea it took about forty years from beginning to end. Once, there was a lake. Now, there is dry dirt, salted fields, dust storms, and an emmigration of a hundred thousand people in less than a decade.

And yes, it can happen here. So I vote on erring on the side of the forests, rather than Paul Bunyan.

Not that anyone will even read this post, buried in a dead thread. Sigh.

We, of course, have Owens Lake in the US, and Mono Lake is disappearing.

We have already have a dustbowl (1930's) and I would imagine another is well with in the realm of possibility.

Those C130 (and DC6, DC7) tankers were not designed for firefighting so it's hardly a surprise that the wings would break off from the stress they undergo.