Dean Talley (Part 1 of 3): Family Man and Tanker Pilot

On March 10, 2018 we lost Dean Talley, one of the iconic air tanker pilots. He flew tankers for about 35 years. His wife,Nancy, told me that Dean loved his yard; he was mowing the lawn when he collapsed under a favorite redwood tree and died. He planted the Redwood as a seedling 30 years ago. Paramedics were quick to respond but were unable to revive him (see Dean’s obituary and a short tribute to Dean from Associated Aerial Firefighters). One of the things on my bucket list was to correspond with Dean Talley. It is my very great loss that I never corresponded with or knew Dean. However, over the years that I have been doing this blog on aerial wildland firefighting, I do feel like I got to know Dean through his posts on the Associated Aerial Firefighters where he served on their board and through social media. More importantly, Dean was an author (see Lone Palm Publishing) and I got to know Dean as a pilot through reading his books. 

Dean at the beach prepared for the sun

My condolences to Nancy, his children and the rest of his family, his friends and colleagues, and all who love Dean. I continue to keep all of you in my prayers. I know that Dean is flying in favorable tail winds.

There is a short biography of Dean from the Chico News and Review on Dean’s author’s page on Lone Palm Publishing.

I had some e-mail correspondence with Dean’s wife, Nancy Talley, a short time ago. I told her about the biography that I found and asked her if she would mind filling in some details. She told me they met in late September 1983. I believe that Dean may have been studying for his airframe and power plant license at that time. By 1986, he had graduated from community college and had gone back to flying air tankers. He married Nancy and they had three children, a boy and two girls. In 1989 he was flying air tankers out of the Chico Air Attack Base, so the Talleys moved to Chico so Dean could be close to the base and close to his family,

Nancy spoke to me of how much he loved his kids. They grew up at the Chico Air Attack Base.

By 2014, Dean was flying a P2V for Minden Air. Nancy spoke of his last flight at Minden and what happened next:

“In 2014, Dean and Taylor (his co-pilot) land a P2V at Fresno with hydraulic failure and a collapsed nose gear. They were within inches of the center line (of the runway) after skidding about a mile. There were no more Minden tankers to fly so Dean went to work for CAL FIRE.”  Earlier in his career, Dean had started flying tankers for CAL FIRE, then known as the California Department of Forestry.

Nancy told me that Dean had recently spent time in southern California at Hemet and Ramona Air Attack Bases covering for the regular pilots while they had a day off. Just before he died he was at ground school, pre-season training for CAL FIRE at McClellan Air Attack Base. She commented that “it was all very sad.”

Last but by no means least, Nancy shared with me about how much he enjoyed working with the young pilots, most recently at CAL FIRE, and before that at other contractors he flew tankers for.  She also told me that the young pilots enjoyed working with and hanging out with Dean. These are some of things that stood out to me of Dean’s rapport with the young pilots:

• He was a gentleman, leaving a loving and lasting impression.
• He told great stories about flying, told with his special sense of humor. His audience hung onto every word.
• He made new pilots feel like they belonged.

Notes: 

This is part 1 of a three-part series on Dean Talley. Part 2 focuses on remembrances of Dean from fellow tanker pilots. In part 3, I provide a very brief overview of some of the aircraft that Dean flew and where you can go for more information.

Links to the  photo of the air tanker were obtained from an airtanker database maintained by Ruud Leeuw  on this webpage with basic information and where possible, a link outside his website to a page with a copyrighted photo. It is the outside link that you see here.