Miranda Fire (part 3 of 3): retardant drops

Larry described the initial response to the Miranda Fire, which burned on Federal lands:

The fire started within 600 feet of state protected land and the initial ground response was by the Oregon Department of Forestry. Tanker 62 was used initially because of a lack of immediately available Federal resources. T62 was released under the current joint use policy when additional Federal resources were on the way. For example, T17 eventually arrived from Moses Lake.

Jim Hansen, Klamath Falls Air Attack, took a series of aerial photos of the Miranda Fire, including tanker operations. These photographs are used here with his permission. Larry added some annotations to these photos that to go along his commentary of the fire. I found that these photos along with Larry's commentary and annotations provided me with an excellent up close and personal look of air tanker operations.

Referring to the photo above, Larry begins by setting the stage:

I had to start the drop a bit early because we had a strong tailwind and they wanted to be sure to tie into the road with retardant to make an anchor point.

He added some annotations so that you can follow along:

Red Arrow: This is the road that I was instructed to be sure to tie into to act as an anchor point.

Greenish Arrow: This is a second road. This drop carried almost to the road with the tailwind.Tanker 17 was to extend this drop and try to start around the head in a right turn. It isn't readily apparent in these pictures,but the terrain rose in the direction of the drops,so a right turn was used for the exit. This picture shows Tanker 62 closely following the leadplane.

Moving on to the second photo, Larry continues:

Red Arrow: This points to the anchor point road from first picture.

Green Arrow: This is the second road that figures in the Tanker 17 drop pictures.

Yellow Circle: This is the leadplane starting his right turn to avoid the rising terrain.

Looking at the third picture, Larry goes on to explain:

Red Arrow: This points to the anchor point road at the beginning of T62's first drop.

Yellow Line: This line shows T62's first drop on the Left Flank of the fire.

Green Line: This line shows T62's retardant line from the second load which anchored to the same road as the first load,but on the Right Flank of the fire.

We end with the fourth and last picture of the series. Tanker 62 had been released from the fire by the time Tanker 17 arrived. Larry says that

This picture shows Tanker 17's second load. This was after I'd been released from the fire, so I can only give an educated guess, which follows:

T17's first load extended T62's first load and this picture shows T17 extending his first load (which had extended T62's first load).

Red Arrow: This is the second road from the first and second pictures. Tanker 62's first drop ended just short of this road.

Yellow Line: This retardant is from T17's first load.There was also a SEAT working on the fire (T845), so any stray retardant that runs at odd angles to the main line is likely from his attempts to fill in or strengthen weak spots in the line.The wind made exact tie-ins difficult.

Green Circle: This is Tanker 17.

Orange Circle: This is the Leadplane.

He wraps by saying that "the parts involving Tanker 62 should be completely accurate. Those on Tanker 17 are probably 95% accurate."

There is not much else I can add to Jim's photos and Larry's wonderful commentary and annotations. He has given us an up close and personal look at tanker operations on the Miranda Fire. I don't know about you, but I found that these pictures and commentary have made tanker operations at a wildfire come alive. Thank-you Larry and Jim!

Miranda Fire: Flying to the fire (part 2 of 3)

When Larry and I were discussing the Miranda he had this to say about the route he took:

Just for reference,when we get a fire to the east of Medford, the terrain usually climbs faster than we can. So,we take the scenic tour until we can get to about 6,000-6,500 ft, which will get us past Mt. McLoughlin on the Four Mile Lake side (just to the north of the mountain) or on the Lake of the Woods side (just to the south). We took the Lake of the Woods path to Miranda as it's a couple of hundred feet lower than going over Four Mile Lake.

I have spent some time thinking about the best graphic to show to go with Larry’s description about the route he took. I settled on this excerpt from an aeronautical chart (Klamath Falls Sectional Chart) covering the Oregon area. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) makes digital raster file versions of Sectional Charts put out by the Federal Aviation Administration, National Aeronautical Charting Office freely available charts on this webpage. These files, probably meant for GPS devices are rather large in size, much too large to reproduce here. However, I was able to use my pdf viewer, to extract the relevant portion of the Klamath  Falls Sectional showing the location of the Miranda Fire.

One of the areas depicted on the chart are different kinds of airspace, e.g. the thick solid purple line around the airport, which I labeled as Medford. Go here to read what I hope is a freely available booklet describing the different kinds of airspace in the U.S. The airport that I labeled Medford, Rouge Valley International Airport, is where Larry’s tanker, tanker 62 is based while on contract with the Oregon Department of Forestry. In flying out of Medford on his way to the Miranda Fire, he had to avoid Mt. McLoughlin (9,495 ft.), that I labeled with the letter A. If you look at the mountain on the chart, you will notice that as the elevation increases, the brown shading darkens. Look around Medford and you will green shading, indicating a lower altitude.

The key here is that Larry has to avoid the higher terrain until he is able to climb to a high enough altitude. Remember that he is flying heavy with a full load of retardant! He did this by flying south of Mt. McLoughlin by Lake of the Woods (“B”). I’m not sure of the exact route he took to the MIranda Fire, labeled on the map. I’m sure that his choice of the route depends on the terrain. But I’m fairly certain that he crossed Upper Klamath Lake, perhaps flying over the area called Modoc Point (see the little purple flag on the east side of the Lake). Modoc Point is a distinctive feature, see the google earth image and you will what seems to be fields at Modoc Point and forested areas to the south of Modoc Point. Pilots flying under visual flight rules often rely on distinctive visual “waypoints” and other features (railroads, powerlines, and roads) noted on the charts.

In closing, I want to acknowledge that aeronautical charts take some getting used to. I spent many hours before, during, and after attending ground school learning my way around aeronautical charts. There were several questions on the FAA written private pilot exam on using aeronautical charts. Passing this written exam, while giving my some confidence, has given me an appreciation for the complexity of flying. I am not going to even try to offer a crash course in using these charts. The AOPA has what I think is a freely available document  here that provides a description of some of the symbols on the chart, with a focus on airspace.

Next up: retardant drops.

Miranda Fire part 1 of 3

Larry Kraus, pilot of Butler’s DC-7 T-62, has been on contract with the Oregon Department of Forestry since early July. Some of you will recall that I have written a couple of series of articles on T62: articles about DC-7 tankers and articles about T62 in action. Larry and I have been in touch since he went on contract. He gave me some information about one of the fires that T62 flew. This was the Miranda Fire, first reported on Thursday July 22. It was located about 10 miles east of Chiloquin, Oregon. It eventually burned about 50 acres before the fire was fully lined later that evening, go here and here for more information on that fire.

I am going to start with the location of the fire, before discussing the approximate route that Larry took to get to the fire in part 2. Part 3 focuses on retardant drops on the Miranda Fire.

Larry gave me the latitude and longitude of the fire which I used to plot the fire in google earth.

Next up, flying to the fire.

Note: As a point of reference, the Miranda Fire is located at 42 degrees 37.4757 minutes north and 121 degrees 40.3301 minutes west.