Norcal Spotted and BS Thread

Similar situations
First is today and second was the camp fire in 2018.

 

Lots of air support today in the Sierras:

https://www.flightradar24.com/37.35,-120.03/9

Super Tankers in use:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=htFK77F11aI

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=a3AWMGQ5ot0

 

Stay safe out there man!

 

Have lots of water and fire pump also have a small tractor and have scraped all neighboring lots. Contacted them at 5 am and got green light so have dirt everywhere now so I ain't sceered.

 

hoping it wont reach Chester

 

Long way off for now. I have been through thats whole ridge and range between here and there and all looks good as of this morning.

 

Great job! Rooting for you!

 

Thank you sir!

 

Absolutely unreal..


IMG_6202 by Cory Bechtold, on Flickr

 

A whole fleet of these DC10 tankers used to be based at the former CAFB:

 

Hang in there! And good luck!

 

Some of you older folks might remember an air tanker crash in the Red Hills (BLM) in the mid 80s. Modesto PD had been conducting tear gas training for its officers in the Red Hills and started a wildfire. Sadly an air tanker crashed fighting the wildfire and the entire crew perished. Later the families of the crew sued the Modesto PD but I can't remember the outcome?

 

Nice camera. Looks like that here, but phone camera won't show it too good. Rusty orange outside.

 

There have been several tanker crashes. It's always sad when it happens.

The hard part is most of the airframes start out as "old", get rebuilt into air tankers. There are a bunch of tanks and equipment to deal with the retardant and probably close to 170,000# of retardant. I'd guess the 747 is pretty close to max takeoff weight when it drops (any tanker probably is).

It's crazy when you think about the stress an airplane is under when operating as a retardant tanker. And 20 years old....

 

Well got word earlier that our house survived the night but there is many many folks above us that lost their house last night/today, I believe my mom is one of them that lost her house (no official word yet... probably not for a while).

 

I tried using my phone as well earlier but it made the photo look like it was just a smoky day. That photo is pretty much straight out of the camera with just a quick adjustment to exposure and a hue change to the tree in the background. Still pretty insane that it's just a lightly edited photo and it still looks like that.

 

I am sorry for the losses, my heart goes out to all those affected.

My parents lost their house to fire back in the 90s due to shoddy electrical work by a contractor.

 

Man it's something else out there.

 

For the better half of a decade I've been working on fighting fires while living in non fire prone areas and all the burnt homes suck to see but its different when you don't know the folks, its not your town, not your response area, you weren't there when the fire hit the house/neighborhood, and you're focused on putting the fire out not the path it traveled and damage it did. Now that I live in a rural area, own a house, and have started making a family... I cannot fathom the fear or loss you and your family and all the other communities and families are going through. I am sorry this is happening and hope it turns out okay.

 

this link to You-Tube, from Blancolirio channel has interesting content on aircraft, airtankers, as well as current fire situation. As I understand it there is considerable cushion for max takeoff weight due to a few factors like small fuel load, no passengers, and considerable carrying capacity to begin with. https://youtu.be/D-pC7XYHV7s