Airtanker numbers (part 2)

On September 9, a couple of days before I went to Vermont, a friend of mine sent me a link to a statement from US Forest Service Chief Tom Tidwell on Aircraft Support for Texas, Other Wildfires Throughout the Country.

If you go and look at the document, you will see a list of the (then?) current fleet of aircraft. My curiosity was aroused by the mention that the fleet included "17 Large Air Tankers which have a capacity of delivering an average of over 2000 gals of water or retardant per trip". I went to the EGBCC Airtanker status page to see how many Airtankers are listed. Note that this site is updated daily. As I write this, I am seeing that the Airtanker status listing for Sept. 20, 2011 includes six Convair 580s. This is three more Convairs than I saw listed on September 9, 2011(trust me, ok?) when the Airtanker status listing for that day reflected only three Convair 580s. As an asid, I went to the Airtanker status page yesterday and saw only three Convairs listed.

Ok, so today (September 20, 2011), there are 17 Large Airtankers (11 P-2s plus six Convair 580s) listed on the EGBCC Airtanker status page, which equals the number referred to in Tidwells statement.

Lets talk about the MAFFS (modular airborne firefighting systems) for a moment. I know that there are a total of eight military C-130s (Air National Guard or Reserve). The MAFFS are called up when all other civilian airtankers are working fires. In Tidwell’s statement (referred to earlier), he mentioned “8  military aircraft specially outfitted to fight fires with an average capacity of 3000 gals.” I am pretty confident that these are the MAFFS, and that of the eight C-130 MAFFS, there may be a smaller number that are currently activated. For example, in todays Airtanker status listing, only four C-130 MAFFs are activated. If memory serves, and again you’ll have to trust me on this, there were six C-130 MAFFS activated a week or so ago. So, at least in regards to the MAFFS, there is some fluidity in the number that may be activated at any one time.

One of the reasons that I am talking about airtanker numbers (again) is because I want to refer you to a very nice article that Bill Gabbert of Wildfire Today wrote on September 13, 2011 and updated on September 14. He refers to the same statement by Tidwell that I discussed earlier, offering his analysis and comments. Some of you may have already seen this. Before I provide the link to Bill’s article, please note that he refers to six (and possibly) seven C-130 MAFFS that were on active status last week. If you read his article as well as the comments, you will see a discussion about the number of Convair 580s that were working fires in the U.S. last week. Bill had confirmation from the USFS that there were eight Convairs working fires last week. Why these Convairs are not all reflected in the EGBCC Airtanker Status listings, I can not say. Nor do I know for certain if there are six or eight Convairs (with two not being listed in the EGBCC Airtanker Status) working fires in the U.S. this week. Anyway, you may find Bill’s September 13 article here. I found this article to be very informative so I am sharing it with you.

In parting, a final point is that whether there are 17 or 19 Large Airtankers (civilian: P-2s and Convair 580s), the figure is significantly lower than the 41 or 42 Large Airtankers that were flying prior to 2002 ( see my Aug. 3 article on Airtanker numbers (part 1).