Tucked behind Durango-La Plata County Airport lies the Durango Airtanker base – a hot swath of asphalt that for the past several weeks was home to three very special airplanes.
The three repurposed passenger jets – one Neptune BAe 146 and two Erickson Aero Tanker MD-87s – were modified to carry 3,000 gallons of fire-retardant slurry each for fighting wildfires, and just happened to be stationed at the base when three wildfires broke out in and around Durango within hours of each other on Saturday, U.S. Forest Service spokesperson Lorena Williams said.
The aircraft were used in coordination with firefighters combating the blazes on the ground, she said. They helped slow the advance of the fires, allowing crews on the ground to dig fire breaks and protect valuable assets like houses and infrastructure.
“Some people get this impression that we’re dumping right onto the head of the fire, and that’s not necessarily true,” Williams said. “You’re putting it basically along the edge of the fire.”
Another misconception people have, she said, is that the fire retardant is an end-all be-all. The retardant only works wet, she said, and if firefighters can’t get into an area where the slurry was dropped before it dries out, its effectiveness is nullified.
“Retardant is not a line because it dries and then it’s game on again,” she said.
Williams said that pilots drop a line of retardant near a wildfire as they fly over the blaze. That, she said, raises the humidity in that specific location, which brings the temperature and the intensity of the fire down. That in turn allows firefighters to get in and dig a fire line, which slows or halts the spread of the fire.
But, Williams said, so much more goes into a plane dropping slurry on a target than meets the eye.
Whenever a wildfire occurs, a fire traffic area is set up, in which multiple aircraft respond to the same fire in specific formation, she said. A smaller spotter plane is sent to circle high above the blaze clockwise in order to keep an eye on and provide detailed instructions to the tanker planes, which fly in counterclockwise circles below. That combination, she explained, avoids any risk of mid-air collisions and pinpoints where the tanker planes should drop their load.
“All of us working under the same protocols to make sure there’s no mid-air collisions, and that everybody is doing the same thing,” said Ryan Swakon, a pilot with Erikson Aeor Tankers.
Swakon said Erikson contracts with the Forest Service to provide the slurry-dropping MD-87s to firefighting agencies across the country. They also hire the pilots who respond to the fires, who are specifically trained to fly wildfire missions.
“Everything you could possibly think of comes into play with dropping retardant on a fire,” Swakon said. “As a pilot, you’re learning how to fight fire, and then how to drop a target on fire, and what’s going to go on within the fire traffic area.”
In addition to knowing how to fly in step with other aircraft responding to a blaze, the pilots need to know how to respond to changes in wind direction, topography, smoke and vegetation type at a split-second, he said.
Kathi Arnold, who had to evacuate from her home on County Road 318 during the Rim Road Fire on Saturday, said these tanker planes helped save her house. In the middle of packing her car to evacuate, fully anticipating that her house would burn down, Arnold watched as tanker planes swooped in and dropped slurry in the path of the advancing blaze. That bought firefighters enough time to get in between her house and the fire, dig a fire line and save her home, she said.
“Planes started coming immediately, one after the other, and they stopped the fire halfway down the hill on the backside of my property,” she said.
Williams said the response to the three wildfires in Durango over the weekend was heavily dependent on the three tankers. For the Elkhorn Fire specifically, she said, the fire started near the Celadon and Elkhorn neighborhoods. With the slurry dropped by the tankers, fire crews were able to draw a line between those homes and the blaze.
“The retardant has been critical for slowing down the fire’s forward spread long enough to get firefighters in on the ground to dig hand line,” she said. “We’ve really relied on air tankers with our strategy.”
Williams said that, like the firefighters on the ground, the pilots at the controls of the tankers are exceptionally brave. She said that their job is nonstop when they are on a fire, and that the precision, timing and dedication they have is remarkable.
“I can only imagine what it’s like to be a tanker pilot,” she said. “They follow a line that has been marked for them, and they just release the load until it’s out, and then they take off again. Those pilots are really exceptional. And fearless.”
sedmondson@durangoherald.com
