Pelican Parts Forums - Fire Planes

Here's a good thread on the IL-76 and the new B-747 waterbomber.. from flymig.com so you know they are biased towards Russian aircraft.. but it's interesting nonetheless..

http://www.flymig.com/forum/posts/1080130220.htm

Now that we've lost 750,000 acres, 23 lives and almost 3,000 homes to the
current string of wildfires in Southern California, it's less than
comforting to be told that better firefighting equipment could have been
brought in to ameliorate the disaster, but that's exactly what U.S.
Representatives Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA) and Curt Weldon (R-PA) contend.

In a Washington, D.C. press conference on October 30, Rohrabacher and Weldon
led a cadre of other officials in decrying the US Forest Service's refusal
to consider the Russian government's Ilyushin-76 (IL-76), an air-tanker that
carries 11,000 gallons of water (more than three times the capacity of the
Hercules C-130, our largest domestic water-drop craft) as part of their fire
suppression arsenal. Rohrabacher, who passionately held the floor and called
for an immediate end to the "bureaucratic logjam" that was keeping this
life- and land-saving technology from our reach, called the conference when
the USFS ignored his demand for a meeting and a prompt, stateside
demonstration of the IL-76's capabilities.

The IL-76 can drop a near-solid sheet of water on an area the size of 12
football fields in 10 seconds, and because it uses a gravitational, rather
than a pressurized, release system, which creates a simulated downpour
rather than an aerosol mist, much more of the water released from its holds
actually makes it to the ground. Since 1995, the Russians have repeatedly
offered a pair of manned, tanked and waiting IL-76s during major U.S. fire
outbreaks-asking only for primary expenses to be covered-but the US Forest
Service, the body in charge of all wildfire control on federal land, has
told them time and again that their services were neither needed nor wanted.

Tom Robinson, a fire administrator and instructor of
fire prevention with the Virginia Offices of Fire Programs and Emergency
Services in Richmond,VA who admits to being a "crusader" and "zealot" on the
subject of the IL-76. In 1996, he joined Global Emergency Response
(waterbomber.com), a Canadian-Russian-American joint venture created to
co-sponsor the IL-76 in disaster mitigation around the world. The venture
looked hopeful at first, with a positive response from a USFS specialist
after a demonstration in England. But the response was squelched on this
side of the Atlantic, and since then, the USFS has stymied all attempts to bring
the IL-76 to the States, even for a further demonstration.

This could well be viewed as criminal, according to Robinson, who says
that most of the homes and many of the lives lost in the last several
major US fires could have been saved had the Russian tanker been
deployed. “I’d risk my reputation on it,” he says; a reputation that
includes Marine service and a plethora of official honors for his work in fire prevention and suppression, including President Bush Sr.’s 1000 Points of Light award and a National Heroism award from the Secretary of HUD. “The plane does not fit into the Forest Service’s method of operation,” he says, “and if they can’t control it, they don’t want anyone else to.” Robinson, a staunch patriot by all accounts, accuses the Forest Service of a misplaced protectionism and overblown national pride. “They just don’t want to relinquish control,” he says, “but someone with good sense is going to take firefighting away from the Forest Service.”

Robinson also says that the US Forest Service continually
misrepresents the Wildfire Suppression Assistance Act of 1989, saying
that it disallows foreign assets to be drawn into a firefighting scenario until all private contractor assets are completely exhausted. What the Act actually states is that foreign assets may be called in when domestic assets are no longer capable or readily available to handle the situation at hand. Contrary to the various reports of on-scene fire control experts and crew commanders, the USFS officially maintains that this type of capability downfall has never occurred.

“Please don’t think we’re picking on the firefighters,” says Robinson,
having been one himself for many years, with a handful of successful
international missions on the IL-76 under his belt. “They are doing
everything they can with what they’ve got.” But what they’ve got, he
says, is insufficient, and the USFS knows it.

Rohrabacher, Weldon and Robinson are hardly alone in their crusade.
Last week, Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) wrote President Bush a letter
requesting that he go over the Forest Service’s head to request an IL-
76 demonstration, but the administration has yet to reply. Perhaps if
the planes were deployed now, at the tail-end of such horrendous
devastation, the public would raise such an outcry over recent,
needless losses that no one would truly benefit, but at this point,
Robinson is not willing to settle for mere capitulation.

“I want vindication,” says Robinson. He also states that some lowerlevel
USFS personnel have come forward to say that they know the
planes should be allowed in, but are loath to speak out for fear of losing
their jobs. “My goal is to stand before the California Legislature and
address the Forest Service in a open forum,” says Robinson. “Forest
Service personnel should be held criminally liable for what they have
done.”