What are these idiots babbling about? I watched DC-10 Tanker 910 drop 12,000 gallons of Phos-Chek near Arrowhead Tuesday afternoon. 
Posted on 10/25/2007 6:24:31 PM PDT by My Favorite Headache
As Calif. fires burned, copters grounded By AARON C. DAVIS and MICHAEL R. BLOOD, Associated Press Writers 2 minutes ago
As wildfires were charging across Southern California, nearly two dozen water-dropping helicopters and two massive cargo planes sat idly by, grounded by government rules and bureaucracy.
How much the aircraft would have helped will never be known, but their inability to provide quick assistance raises troubling questions about California's preparations for a fire season that was widely expected to be among the worst on record.
It took as long as a day for Navy, Marine and California National Guard helicopters to get clearance early this week, in part because state rules require all firefighting choppers to be accompanied by state forestry "fire spotters" who coordinate water or retardant drops. By the time those spotters arrived, the powerful Santa Ana winds stoking the fires had made it too dangerous to fly.
The National Guard's C-130 cargo planes, among the most powerful aerial firefighting weapons, never were slated to help. The reason: They've yet to be outfitted with tanks needed to carry thousands of gallons of fire retardant, though that was promised four years ago.
"The weight of bureaucracy kept these planes from flying, not the heavy winds," Republican U.S. Rep. Dana Rohrabacher told The Associated Press. "When you look at what's happened, it's disgusting, inexcusable foot-dragging that's put tens of thousands of people in danger."
Rohrabacher and other members of California's congressional delegation are demanding answers about aircraft deployment. And some fire officials have grumbled that a quicker deployment of aircraft could have helped corral many of the wildfires that quickly flared out of control and have so far burned 500,000 acres from Malibu to the Mexican border.
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and other state officials have defended the state's response, saying the intense winds prevented a more timely air attack.
"Anyone that is complaining about the planes just wants to complain," Schwarzenegger replied angrily to a question Wednesday. "The fact is that we could have all the planes in the world here — we have 90 aircraft here and six that we got especially from the federal government — and they can't fly because of the wind."
Indeed, winds reaching 100 mph helped drive the flames and made it exceedingly dangerous to fly. Still, four state helicopters and two from the Navy were able to take off Monday while nearly two dozen others stayed grounded.
Thomas Eversole, executive director of the American Helicopter Services & Aerial Firefighting Association, a Virginia-based nonprofit that serves as a liaison between helicopter contractors and federal agencies, said valuable time was lost.
"The basis for the initial attack helicopters is to get there when the fire is still small enough that you can contain it," Eversole said. "If you don't get there in time, you quickly run the risk of these fires getting out of control."
The first of the 15 or so fires started around midnight Saturday. By Sunday afternoon, fires were raging in Los Angeles, San Diego and Orange counties.
At the request of firefighters on the ground, at 4 p.m. Sunday the state Office of Emergency Services asked the National Guard to supply four helicopters. Under state rules, a California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection "spotter" must accompany each military and National Guard helicopter to coordinate water drops.
The spotters have 24 hours to report for duty, and it took nearly all that time for them and the National Guard crews to assemble. By the time they were ready to go, the winds had made it unsafe to fly.
The helicopters finally got off the ground Tuesday.
Mike Padilla, aviation chief for the forestry department, acknowledged the Guard's helicopters were ready to fly before the spotters arrived. He said state officials were surprised.
"Typically we're waiting for them to get crews," Padilla said.
The delay was even longer for Navy and Marine helicopters. They were ready to fly Monday morning but didn't get airborne until Wednesday morning, a period when the acreage that burned quadrupled to more than 250,000 and the number of homes destroyed jumped from 34 to more than 700.
Republican U.S. Rep. Brian Bilbray was among the lawmakers who learned late Tuesday night in a briefing with state officials that 19 military helicopters were not in use because there were no spotters.
Alarmed, he quickly helped broker an agreement to waive the spotter requirement, allowing flights to begin Wednesday.
"We told them, 'You don't want the public to be asking why these units weren't flying while we had houses burning,'" Bilbray told the AP.
The criticism helped prompt the forestry department's director, Ruben Grijalva, to abandon the state's long-standing policy to have a spotter aboard each aircraft and instead let one spotter orchestrate drops for a squadron of three helicopters.
"I directed them to do whatever was necessary to get those other military assets into operation," Grijalva said.
He said he could not explain why more spotters were not deployed before the flames spread to ensure that every aircraft ready to fly could take off.
Padilla said state spotters do training exercises with the Navy and National Guard and are used to working with them on fires. That's not the case with the Marines, so when helicopters from that branch were made available, the state was caught off guard and had no spotters available.
Regardless, he said, safety — not availability of spotters — was the overriding concern in determining when to allow aircraft into the skies.
"I'm not going to risk people's lives for a bunch of vegetation," Padilla said. "We know you have lives and property at stake, but you don't throw away firefighter lives like that."
The C-130 saga is a much different story.
More than a decade ago, Congress ordered replacement of the aging removable tanks for the military planes because of safety concerns and worries that they wouldn't fit with new-model aircraft. California's firefighting C-130 unit is one of four the Pentagon has positioned across the country to respond to fire disasters.
New tanks were designed, but they failed to fit into the latest C-130s. Designers were ordered back to the drawing board. Republican Rep. Elton Gallegly said Congress was assured the new tanks would be ready by 2003.
Four years later, the U.S. Forest Service and Air Force have yet to approve the revised design. Air Force spokeswoman Capt. Paula Kurtz said "technical and design difficulties" have delayed the program.
Rohrabacher and Gallegly are angered by the delay, which has left no C-130s capable of fighting fires on the West Coast. The last of the older-model C-130s with an original tank was retired by the California National Guard last year.
"It's an absolute tragedy, an unacceptable tragedy," Gallegly said.
The situation meant that rather than deploying C-130s from inside the state, Schwarzenegger was forced to ask Secretary of Defense Robert Gates to call in the six remaining older C-130s from other states as far away as North Carolina.
None of them began fighting the fires until Wednesday afternoon.
In the meantime, the state relied mostly on smaller retardant tankers that carry about a third of the C-130's 3,000-gallon capacity.
Gallegly said such firepower was sorely needed earlier.
"I have actually flown in one and pressed the button," he said. "I know what they can do."
(This version corrects congressman's last name, Gallegly, not Gallegy.)
AP and the rest of the MSM have been frothing at the mouth to be able to find someone to pin some blame on here. Nevermind the arsonists responsible for them...no no..quick..find someone in the military of Bush’s government to blame.
This is a NON STORY. The simple fact is that those “spotters” are there for two very good reasons. 1) De-conflict the airspace. 2) Make sure the air crews aren’t dropping on back-fires that were intentionally set. These rules were added after issues cropped up in 2003 when out-of-area resources came in.
Had they flown the next story would have been the wasted money and unnecessary danger to the crews.
I am in agreement with you 100%. Let’s see how much it is a non-story tomorrow morning when we wake up and the talking heads are discussing the good things about the firefighters.
Bush’s fault. The fire spotters were all transfered to Iraq.
http://www.estripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=49763
U.S.: Fire response not hurt by deployment of troops to wars
http://www.af.mil/news/story.asp?id=123073301
C-130s fight California wildfires
http://www.af.mil/news/story.asp?id=123073350
Airmen transport firefighting support
http://www.af.mil/news/story.asp?id=123073332
Altus supports California firefighting
http://www.af.mil/news/story.asp?id=123073292
C-17 delivers Army equipment to fight wildfires
NORTHCOM Commander Outlines California Wildfire Response
Federal Resources Assist Residents, Firefighters Responding to Southern California Wildfires
http://www.navycompass.com/news/newsview.asp?c=228179
NASNI Provides Shelter for Families Displaced by Raging Wildfires
http://www.navycompass.com/news/newsview.asp?c=228181
NB Kitsap Firefighters Volunteer to Fight San Diego Wildfires
http://www.munciefreepress.com/node/17778
US Navy “High Rollers” continue fighting California Wildfires
http://www.usmc.mil/marinelink/mcn2000.nsf/0/4EF937A9838FE24A8525737D00718CF6?opendocument
Camp Pendleton Marines aid in California wildfire relief
Federal Resources Assist Residents, Firefighters Responding to Southern California Wildfires
When they can’t safely fly, they do not fly. How hard is that to understand. If we let these pilots have their say, every one of them would risk their lives and fly. They want to go. God Bless Them.
Everyone involved in this did a good job (and I never thought I would hear myself saying that about a government operation.) There aren’t any negative stories besides the fire itself. The AP should just go home before they sprain something.
Well folks, as I see it, we are so accustomed to seeing things in movies where getting airborne at a moments notice is right infront of us on a screen. That only happens in movies, not in real life. It takes a lot preparation and sometimes military aircraft just can’t be jumped into and taken off on a moments notice. Especially when the use of the aircraft differs from its normal mission. You can have 5 C-130s on a flight line but they may not be 100% ready (deadlined)and no one will authorize them to fly unless they are. Hence, you are going to have to wait until parts are delivered, installed and the plane is flight tested, before they will release them for a mission. Taking a plane from another state or cross loaning isn’t as simple as it seems either. Someone has to sign for it and go over every piece of equipment attached to it before they get the OK to take it. Of course all this may have changed since I left but I doubt it.
fixed the title...
WHAT??? Are you saying that what I see in the movies is not reality?????? Are you saying that all of that BS is fake?????
Hmmmm, assuming that you are right, why in the hell would I ever watch a movie????????
What are these idiots babbling about? I watched DC-10 Tanker 910 drop 12,000 gallons of Phos-Chek near Arrowhead Tuesday afternoon.
You're not supposed to let the truth interfere with the official narrative.
Stupid women on CNN saying they should have been flying the first two days, did interviews with “critics”, she says its “keeping them honest”.
Why are only women and gay men reporters?
Because math was too hard in college?
The massive Greek fires several weeks ago were blamed on arson. There were questions then if Muslim Albanians had set Greece on fire as terrorism or retribution.
Setting fires is a lot cheaper - and safer - than trying to transport and release anthrax, dirty nukes, and bombs.
I wonder if this is low risk, high reward terrorism. The Godom and Somomorra of the US is burning right now.
Just a week or so ago there were articles on FR about how old and poorly maintained these planes are, with the conclusion that much stricter regulations should be in place.
Then when fires happen, the claim is that the restrictions already in place are too strict.
Godom and Somomorra?
Oh...Gotum and some more of?
I guess that's what the get for being greedy...
:o
Also with a hell of a lot less fingerprints and cameras in the woods. Shoot off a few flare guns and swoooooosh...fire.
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