Reflections on CL-215.415 amphibious air tankers

I first became acquainted with the CL-215/415 amphibious  air tankers in the spring of 2009 (e.g, see my April 2009 article) shortly after I began writing about aerial wildland firefighting. The CL-215 was built by Canadair, first flew in 1967, This amphibious airtanker scoops water out of a waterbody. The CL-215T was a turboprop version of the CL-215 resulting in an increase in power. In 1986 Canadair soled the manufacturing rights to Bombardier. Based on the success of the CL-215T, Bombardier introduced the CL-415, with two turboprop engines. The CL-415 is often referred to as the “super scooper.” Many of the videos that you might see of these amphibious air tankers around the internet are likely to be CL-415s. I love watch these videos of the CL-215/415 aircraft in action. I have seen videos of these aircraft scooping and working fires, often in pairs, inU.S., Canada, and in Europe. Scoop and drop, scoop and drop.

In November 2016 Bombradier sold the manufacturing rights to Viking Air, see Bill Gabbert’s November 2016 Fire Aviation article for more information and this 2016 press release from Viking Air. Viking’s page on the 415 may be found here. For a discussion of the CL-215T vs the CL-415 including information about the CL-415EAF go here. Bill Gabbert wrote about Viking's CL-415EAF  upgrade in this March 2020 article.

Here is a nice article from yubanet on the visit of one of Aero-Flite’s CL-415s to Grass Valley Airport in June of 2019. I believe that this aircraft was on a call-when-needed contract with the USFS.

Among the operators of the CL-415 that I know of in the United States and Canada are Air Spray, Aero-Flite , and Babcock. In 2016 the United States Forest Service awarded a five year exclusive use contract to Aero-Flite for two of their CL-415s for five years, that contract was cancelled in after the 2017 wildfire season, see Bill Gabbert’s November 29, 2017 Fire Aviation article for more information . I believe, but am not sure, that a couple of Aero-Flite’s 415’s have been under a call-when-needed contract with the USFS in 2018 and 2019.

The Province of Quebec has a fleet of CL-415s, they have leased two of this amphibious aircraft to Los Angeles County each fall for over 25 years, go this September 2019 press release from the County of Los Angeles for more information.

Here are a couple of short videos of CL-415's working fires in Europe:


Direct link to video on Youtube


Direct link to video on Youtube